


Exhumed

by bloomblood



Series: Microcosm [3]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Comicverse), Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Angst, BDSM, Blood and Violence, Bondage, Bottom Peter Parker, Bottom Tony Stark, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Married Couple, Married Life, No Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, POV Peter Parker, POV Tony Stark, Post-Apocalypse, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Protective Peter Parker, Secret Relationship, Sexual Roleplay, Top Peter Parker, Top Tony Stark, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-01-12 01:02:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 19,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18435803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloomblood/pseuds/bloomblood
Summary: A decade following Peter’s return to Tony after the Snap, the last Avengers face a changed world. Civilians aren’t the only sensitive matter they’ll protect as they struggle to keep their relationship—and Peter’s blood—hidden.





	1. Butterscotch Beard

“Mr. Parker?”

Peter’s eyes lift as he’s addressed. They settle across the classroom on the instructor.

“Silence _all_ phones,” she says, though she’s kind and crinkled not only from age, but her smile.

“Right. Sorry.”

Peter clears his throat. In his lap, the screen of his phone remains lit with Tony’s text, which he reads as he mutes notifications.

“Good. Now. I invite you all to relax. Breathe in, slowly, through the nose.”

The class participates, though Peter isn’t surprised by the collective willingness to shed stress. Like him, he imagines most of his peers are here because they, too, dropped school post-Snap.

“And out through the mouth. Good. Good.”

Aunt May would be her age now. Peter’s heart snags in his chest.

“The General Education Diploma test is your new beginning and I wish you the utmost success. You’ll begin with the Mathematics portion. You have 115 minutes to solve each quantitative and algebraic problem presented. Use of the calculator is only permissible after the first five problems are solved and answered. Failure to comply will result in your immediate dismissal and termination of your test.

“Now.” The instructor sighs. Even her breath is bright and Peter likes her, finding that he’s comforted by her voice. “With that out of the way, if everyone is ready... _begin_.”

*

Tony is outside, leaning on the Audi he drove to the community college to pick up Peter. He’s dressed in a two-piece thing, flower prints over a simple white T, a pair of peach shades shielding his eyes. They match his hair—blonde at the crown, blending to grey at the sides—and complement his butterscotch beard.

Peter laughs. The arc reactor glowing on Tony’s shirt is the most serious thing about the man who’s grown eccentric with age. He descends the stairs, hands shoved in the pockets of his shorts. Karen speaks through his glasses via a Bluetooth in his ear, but Peter is tuning her out as he gets to the car.

“I want to kiss you,” Peter says.

“Now, now. We must behave ourselves”—Tony smooths Peter’s sunkissed, reddish hair—“in public.”

“Just a peck. Something sweet on the cheek, c’mon, Anthony. Seven hours. Apart. I _hurt_.”

Tony opens the passenger door. Peter puffs out his cheeks, though when Tony taps his ass as he leans in the car, Peter grins and is sated. The door swings shut. Tony rounds the car to the driver’s side and locks them in, extending his hand to Peter.

“I hate leaving it home,” Peter says, plucking the wedding ring from Tony’s palm.

“One: _your_ idea. Two: let _me_ , my little educated one.”

Peter snorts. He returns the vibranium band. His eyes sting as he watches Tony slide the jewelry home and he swallows back the flames licking his throat.

“We’ve never been apart that long in 10 years.”

“ _Almost_ 10\. And I know,” Tony says. “It killed me, too, kid. But _how did it go_? You aced it, right? Of course you did, what am I saying?”

Tony starts the car. Peter allows the tears to slip from his eyes and snorts a laugh too flooded with feelings to sound glad.

“I know, baby.” He grips Peter’s thigh. “It’s different.”

“I don’t like it.”

“We could always go back.”

They look at each other as long as traffic allows before Tony is forced to return his attention to driving.

“No,” Peter says. “You said five and then five went by and I said five and now it’s today.”

“It could be more.”

The hand inches closer to Peter’s crotch. He props his elbow on the sill of the window.

“Don’t tempt me,” Peter says.

“I wouldn’t _dream_ of it.”

Peter relaxes further, watching the world smear by outside the window. “I’m starving,” he says, recalling the day he’s had.

*

_“I’m a biophysicist without any proof. I didn’t even finish high school, Anthony. How am I gonna make it out there?”_

__

__

_Tony gestured to himself. “Billionaire husband, here.”_

__

__

_“No. I mean as me. As_ Peter Parker. _Not Peter Benjamin—”_

__

__

_“Does ‘billionaire husband’ mean_ nothing _to you?”_

__

__

_“Anthony.” Peter sighed. Tony gripped his shoulders; kissed his hair._

_“Kid. You’re 22 and Spider-Man. That equation requests that you be poor. But I get it. And we’ll fix it. And don’t scowl like that, you’ll get wrinkles.”_

*

They have two homes. One presents as “Peter’s,” a luscious, industrial loft a man of 26 would love to inhabit. The other is _theirs_ : a spacious, modern penthouse lined with tech that makes smart use of its architectural layout. They’re here most days, though Peter avoids the more sun-soaked rooms until dusk. It’s much unlike his loft in this way. While that space is brick and wood with splashes of yellow and grey, he keeps it dark in areas void of plants.

And they visit it. They alternate between here and there and make sure Peter appears to have his own separate life. But Peter wants to be wherever Tony needs to be, and Tony needs the sleek and intelligent shell around their lab.

A chef is on their way to the luxury estate to cook dinner for Mr. and Mr. Stark. While they wait, Peter seeks out Tony with a magenta immunity shot, finding him in his closet.

“Oh, come,” Tony says, though he accepts it. Peter’s brows quirk as Tony sniffs.

“Don’t be like that.”

“What’s in this one?”

“Cum.”

“Well in that case.” And Tony tosses it back. He presses the empty glass in Peter’s palm.

Peter kisses Tony’s bare shoulder. He drops the small dish into his pocket. “Thank you.”

“Thank _you_ , honeylamb. But you don’t have to worry so...excessively. This?” Tony taps the ring of metal flush with his chest. “Keeps me as healthy as I’ll ever need to be.”

“Your hair’s the only thing that’s changed.”

“Why, yes, surely you didn’t think you’d stop perfection, what with your crystals and cell renewal and such.”

Peter’s laugh is soft. He nuzzles Tony’s jaw and sighs as their arms encircle each other. The arc reactor gleams between their chests.

*

“Chef’s here.”

“Thank God,” Peter says, launching himself across the room with a flip. He lands before the elevator doors peel apart and his mouth drops at the man revealed within.

_“Happy?”_

Peter’s vision blurs. In a hurry, he gathers the trays Happy had come to their home with, backing away to let the man inside.

“Happy’s our _chef_?” Peter asks as Tony appears to clamp his friend in a hug. They slap each other’s backs, clearing their throats before they turn to Peter.

“Who else would I allow in our home, kid?”

“But he _cooks_?”

“Happy does everything.”

Peter is _spinning_. His smile stretches the muscles in his neck when he hurries away to set the food in the kitchen. Happy and Tony join him, also grinning. Peter sits at the center seat of the island.

“Does he...know…?” Peter asks. His left hand curls, shifting the ring.

“Well, _no_ , but….”

“About the immortality?” Happy asks. “Because the Legendary Stark must _never_ die.”

Tony snorts. He slips behind Peter and grabs his left wrist, extending Peter’s arm so his hand is displayed.

“Is that…? You—wait,” Happy says, setting down the lobster he’d unbagged, “because I need to make sense of it first.”

“Six years in September,” Tony says.

Peter’s eyes squint. “Is that _alive_?”

“Big secret. No one knows. No one _can_ know,” Tony says. “I mean it, Happy.”

“Hey. Look who you’re talking to.”

“I know. It’s just, this isn’t the usual and…. We need you to _die_ with this.”

Happy deflates at the sudden, lethal tone. His eyes meet Peter’s. Peter snaps his teeth through a celery stick, his own stare cold and unwavering.

*

“We missed you,” Tony says, later, when they’re all sharing the meal. Happy nods, muttering something similar through his food, then nods again as Peter refreshes his wine.

“Thanks, Pete,” Happy says. “You look good. Both of you do. Likin’ the hair.” He points his fork at Tony. “I still can’t believe it, though I’m not surprised, when you think about it. You two. _Always_ in love with each other.”

Peter laughs.

“But it works, even better than you and—well, you know. Sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Tony says. “All in the past. Healed from. Trust me.”

They finish their food and Peter pats his belly, which looks as flat as it did when he woke this morning. Tony tells FRIDAY to turn on the news, presses a kiss to Peter’s hair as he passes him by, gathering dishes.

“Still fighting crime?” Happy asks Peter, careful in the way he arranges his words.

“Not yet. I mean, I will. I plan to. It’s just that we’ve only been back a month and I just took the GED tests today. We’re...adjusting.”

_“And with Tony Stark’s silent return after an overlong 10-year absence, civilians aren’t welcoming of the philanthropist formerly known as Iron Man.”_

“‘Formerly?’” Tony scoffs. “FRIDAY, turn that up.”

“Yes, Mr. Stark.”

 _“I mean, he came back outta nowhere,”_ an interviewee says, _“not a bye, not a hi, just gone for years—a decade—while the crime went up and we just out here fending for ourselves.”_

__

__

_“I thought he died, ya know? When everyone else just...vanished.”_ A woman shakes her head. _“Then to know all this time, he was just out there, living his life while everyone suffered. Not even a single donation….”_

“Turn this shit off, FRIDAY,” Peter says.

“Certainly, Mr. Stark.”

“No,” Tony injects just as the flat screen zips to black. “I need to know what we’re dealing with here.”

“Right away, Mr. Stark,” the AI says.

“That’s not confusing at all.” Happy. Peter straightens in his seat beside him.

_“They were even talkin’ ‘bout seein’ dude out with Spider-Man up near Canada. Goin’ round sometimes, flyin’ together just as gay as a bird in spring.”_

Happy chokes up a laugh. He hurries to smother it in his wine when Tony and Peter pin him with glares.

 _“We don’t_ need _superheroes. We survived this long without them, what the hell they coming back for now?”_

*

“Same time next week?” Happy asks as they gather at the elevator. They hug him and watch the doors close when he leaves.

*

“Pete.”

Peter peers down from where he’s perched up on the balcony that overlooks their vast living space.

“Did we make a mistake?” Tony asks.

“Doing what? Saving the world like you did for several years, and me, the bit I did before Thanos?”

Peter throws himself off the rail, pinning it with his web so he swings into a safe, silent landing. Tony makes room for him on the enormous, curving couch, humming when Peter crawls between his legs.

“Don’t listen to their shit,” Peter says. He pushes up Tony’s shirt to kiss his stomach.

“They don’t deserve you.”

“It’s you they don’t deserve. They keep this up and I won’t let them have you.”

“So you’re thinking about it, too? Going back?”

Peter sighs. He lies on Tony’s chest and takes off his glasses. “I don’t know,” he says in the quiet. City lights speckle the picture beyond their many windows and he looks at the urban scene with some despair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because how long could we wait for this, really?


	2. Some Special Food

Tony faces the suit. A wall of glass is between him and the idle tower of armor, and in it, he sees Peter approaching his back.

“It’s two in the morning….”

“I’m coming,” Tony says, touching the hand that circles his throat from behind.

“You’re thinking about the news? Those people?” Peter sticks a kiss to Tony’s nape. “They don’t know you.”

“But I didn’t, did I? Not one donation.”

“And where were these same civilians when you flew a nuclear missile into a wormhole? A suicide mission, and it left you so messed up. I just….”

Tony chuckles. He turns, facing Peter, whose hand he still holds, which he kisses across the knuckles; over the ring.

“I don’t see why you owe anyone anything,” Peter continues. His voice is sleepy and rough, reminding Tony of Peter’s younger years.

He gathers his husband close. “Let _me_ deal with them,” Tony murmurs. But he knows Peter, who long since grew into both the Spider and the Man, back in the woods. He’ll require more to assent to Tony’s wishes. He always requires a certain degree of Tony’s sensual force when it comes to leaving Tony’s protection to Tony.

Peter twists his mouth to respond, as Tony anticipates. He seals Peter shut with a kiss, sucks the retort into the dark and silent well of his belly.

“Came to bring me to bed?”

“It was cold.” Peter licks Tony’s tongue. “And boring. And quiet.”

“Yeah?”

“Empty.”

“Tragic.”

“Painful.”

Tony backs Peter all the way to their bedroom, where he kicks shut the door behind them. Peter laughs when Tony jostles him back on the bed with push. While Tony shoves off his lounge pants, Peter peels off his shirt, and the clothes they shed make colorful hills on the floor.

The bed—and Peter—smell of apricot and honey body wash. Tony tastes Peter’s shoulder; his throat. When he pins his teeth on the youthful jaw, Peter sighs.

“Turn,” Tony begins between the breaths allowed when Peter isn’t kissing him, “over.”

Peter does it. Tony bites a cheek, smacks the other.

“Mr. Stark….”

“Ah, _Mr. Stark_ now, hm?”

Peter gives a solicitous nod.

“You’re trying to be so pretty, aren’t you? Trying to get your way with me, even though you know how this ends?”

 _“Yes,”_ Peter croaks. Already wanton. Already made of pudding.

“Fuck, Peter, you are very _bad_ still. Show me your sweet little hole. God, yes, _look at that thing_.”

Tony spits in it. Peter presses dents into his skin as he grips himself apart for Tony’s pleasure.

It’s often like this: Tony devouring Peter as though he’s some special food, licking him deep, sucking his balls from the back. Peter’s quick mouth frequently lands him in this pinch, though both emerge pleased and properly sated.

And it draws them closer, these meetings, no matter which of them wins, though neither loses with love such as theirs.

Tony turns his wrist so his palm faces the bed and his first and middle fingers hook into Peter. When he presses the tender prostate, Peter blurts out a cry. The sound infects the rhythm of Tony’s heart.

“They weren’t up there on Titan or...to talk—to talk about how you should be now, how— _ah_ ….”

“Why do you fight me, Peter?” Tony’s voice is controlled, though the fondness can be determined if one should listen.

“I don’t want—they don’t _appreciate_ you.”

It sounds messier now. Peter is spreading his legs so far apart on the bed that he’s open like a frog pinned to a tray. Tony—the scientific genius that he is—savors the notion that Peter is now his experiment.

“And what did I _just say_ before we came in here?” Tony asks as he’s blessing Peter’s prostate with a massage.

“ _Ungh_ —okay,” Peter says, panting now, his hips swinging away from the bed. “ _Okay_ , I heard what you s-said.”

Tony’s fingers stop. Peter reels, peering over his shoulder at Tony with an offended glare. “What did I say?” Tony asks again.

They stare at each other. Tony sees the defiance and the helplessness in Peter.

“Let _you_ deal with it,” Peter says with shimmering eyes.

“Because you trust me. Yes?”

“Just...keep doing what you were doing to me, please, and we can—”

Tony folds over Peter. “Because you _trust_ me.”

Peter sets free the tears. Tony hears them launch into the sheets. “You know I _trust you_ , Anthony.”

*

Now, Peter is curled on his side, pinning his folded legs against his chest. If the moonlight were sun, Tony would see the pinkness on Peter’s skin.

He positions himself at Peter’s offered entrance. Both men are wet with lube and spit. “I know what you need,” Tony says in a new, private tone, respecting the delicate state of things while pressing into Peter several inches.

Peter responds with a rich, honied moan. His eyes squeeze shut and he buries his face in his knees.

“That’s it.”

_“Fuck….”_

“Just us,” Tony says. “Just us, Pete.”

Peter’s nodding again, biting his lip. He clenches as Tony takes hold of him, keeps him still as he works Peter open.

“And you’re safe,” Tony continues. “You’re so safe, baby, nothing’s changed. You’ve never been more safe than when I’m in you like this. When I’m fucking you in our sheets and cumming inside you and making you feel so loved and so mine, hm?”

“ _Yes_ , I love you, Tony.”

“That’s how you know when I say _I’ll handle it_ , you have _nothing_ to fret about, isn’t it?”

“Yes, that’s how. _Fuck_ , yes, say more to me, please, _please do it._ ”

Tony unfolds Peter, who’s such a supple flower now that Tony’s expanded his hole, as well as his heart. He spreads him on his back, hears the bed squish beneath them and bows over Peter to suck his lips.

“Hold up your legs,” Tony says. “ _More_ , turtle dove. That’s right, all the way up for me, isn’t that better? How _bendy_ you are, Peter. Look at how perfectly you spread yourself for me, taking my dick like this with those gorgeous tears in your eyes. _Crying_ to be fucked by your husband. Letting your husband fuck you however he wants because you trust him _so much_ , don’t you?”

*

Later, when Tony bends Peter over the armchair, Peter squirms and squeals against its fabric.

“Let me fuck it,” Tony says in a spicy, secret voice, steadying Peter’s hips as he smashes into him.

*

Tony wakes with an appetite. Peter is sleeping sideways on the other side of the bed, his bare butt uncovered amongst their sheets. Tony blinks his heavy eyes and contemplates getting closer after a night as wild with emotion as theirs had been.

He is hungover from it.

The taste of Peter is on his teeth and tongue. His cum has dried along Peter’s thighs where it’d slipped from deep inside where Tony had purposely deposited it. Bite marks decorate Tony’s arms in unplanned patterns, put upon his flesh as Peter had orgasmed.

He loves Peter. It’s tragic. Tony’s accepted the future that will come when one of them dies and it kills the other, but it frightens him now—on mornings like this—when he’s watching the sun caress his husband’s back.

*

Tony doesn’t brush his teeth before he leaves in the Audi dressed in casual slacks and a cream, floral shirt. If he’d stayed, he’d never have left, and later, wouldn’t dare to step outside without his spouse.

“However many times you want,” Tony had said of them saving the world. Yet, the fear of losing his husband while saving said world has grown greater than how he felt watching Peter as he atomized to dust.

He isn’t a third of the way into his drive when the car begins to ring with Peter’s call.

“Here we go.” Tony sniffs and rakes a hand through his hair. “Answer it,” he tells FRIDAY. “And take the wheel.”

The world beyond the vehicle dissolves into their bedroom, which overcomes the span of Tony’s windshield.

“Hey, baby,” Tony greets. “How’d you sleep?”

“Where are you?”

“I just had this idea and I didn’t wanna wake you.”

“So you left me in the house, by myself.”

“Pete—”

_“Why?”_

Tony’s inspired to take back control of the car when he witnesses Peter’s distress. Instead, he reminds himself again of the promise he’d made to Peter in the lab a decade ago. 

“What if I’m back,” Tony begins, holding Peter’s pixelated gaze, “and something happens—a job for Iron Man, specifically—but you’re sleep when I have to go? When I have to leave you in the house, by yourself?”

Peter’s face contorts, brows shooting up in surprise before he scowls and then, at last, frowns in defeat. He looks away from the screen. He’s not even wearing his glasses, so upset he must have been by waking alone.

“I’m just getting breakfast,” Tony soothes.

Peter picks his nail.

“But we have to...get used to this, Pete. Unless you wanna go back home, and if you do, you have to say it _now_.”

 _Home._ Tony’s pulse skips, matching the breathless shape of Peter’s rather appealing set of chapped lips.

“We said _this_ would be home now,” Peter says.

“I know. And we’re doing well so far.”

“I dunno….”

“We are. Okay? No need to be upset, everything’s fine. I’m just getting breakfast, and then I’m gonna come back and we’re gonna eat in bed and figure this out together.”

Tony searches Peter’s face. When his husband shrugs a shoulder in consent, Tony finds himself able to breathe.

“Bagels,” Peter says. “Toasted.”

“With butter?”

“Yes. And sausage. The links.”

“Your favorite.”

“And fried eggs. Hard. And syrup—”

“For the sausage,” Tony adds. “I know.”

Peter laughs and dashes his hand across one leaky eye. “I’m so stupidly emotional,” he says.

“It’s not stupid, Pete. You tend to be full of tears after cumming two times in one night.”

“Anthony!”

“ _Just_ saying. What do you want to drink?”

“Pineapple soda.”

“You disgust me.”

“And can you see if they have fresh black bottoms?”

*

Tony lugs a greasy paper bag into the kitchen, the other holding their drinks, utensils, and napkins. Peter, who enters the room crawling across the ceiling, lands on the island between its twin sinks.

“Good morning,” Peter says, crossing his legs. Tony steps before him after setting down their breakfast, taking hold of Peter’s strong thighs.

They kiss. They both still taste of sex.

“Are you upset?” Tony presses his forehead to Peter’s. Peter tugs the hem of Tony’s shirt.

“More like afraid.”

“Baby. I know. And it doesn’t help that you look this debauched right now. Wanna take you again, right where you _sit_.”

A distinct, submissive quality is present in Peter now, in the way he lowers his eyes and bites his lip. Tony shifts back to better see the total image. He decides they should eat before falling back into sex. 

The feast occurs in bed, as Tony had planned. They’re naked—but for the sheets—so sauce and grease are sticking to parts of their bodies that wouldn’t be touched had they been dressed. As Tony’s watching Peter soak sausage links in his syrup, his phone rings, projecting an image of Happy.

He meets Peter’s eyes. Peter cranes his neck to see who’s calling. Only when he approves does Tony answer.

 _“Stark residence!”_ he and Peter sing.

“I’ve been wanting to do that,” Tony says to Peter. “Have you been wanting to do that?”

“Ever since we signed the marriage license,” Peter replies.

“Remember when you were freaking out? About how long it’d take for it to be certified?”

Peter laughs. “And we had to—”

“Hel- _lo_ ,” Happy drones.

“Oh. Sorry.” Peter’s flushed. He pushes bites of bagel into his mouth.

“Will you both just turn on the news?” Happy asks.

“That’s it?” Tony mutters. “Could’ve shot us a text for that, but alrighty.”

From Peter’s phone, a projection of the local news erupts. Tony straightens his back while regarding the scene.


	3. All Very Romantic

_“...while Tony Stark_ is _in fact rumored to be married, we don’t know to whom, nor…”_

Peter bounces from bed. He’s surprised by the grace which he does it, how his landing is silent, despite how heavy he feels. The sheet that’d tangled about one of his legs drags heaps of hot food to the floor. From the mess, a juicy link strikes Peter’s foot.

“No,” Peter says. “No, no. Our papers, they’re—”

“Confidential.”

Tony stands beside the bed, snatching up his clothes. He jerks them on with a scowl. The reporter continues.

“How could they— _fuck_. Fuck!”

“Happy,” Tony says as he draws his shirt over the arc reactor. “Gonna call you back.”

Peter tugs his hair. Tony shuts off his phone. The broadcast they’d been viewing zips from sight.

“They have nothing,” Tony says. His voice is even, and when he approaches Peter—who’s nude and red all over—he takes him by the biceps, adding, “They know _nothing_. We signed confidential documents—”

“So how—?”

“—that are protected. By law.”

“But they said—”

“It’s not the same world, kid. It’s not the same. They _hate_ me out there. They hate _heroes_ out there. Now whatever it is, whatever they think they know, it has nothing to do with you.”

Peter shakes his head as Tony squeezes his arms. “They’re gonna find out. Tony, they’re gonna know, and then they’re gonna come looking for us. Because that’s what they do, that’s how it goes. The lover of a hero is _always_ a target, always a _weakness_. And we’re _married_ , so—”

“It’s not gonna get that far.”

“You’re not—”

“It’s not gonna get that far,” Tony repeats. His eyes are deep and imploring.

“Cut me off again,” Peter says, a shard of warning sticking in his words. “I just dare you.”

Tony releases Peter, his hands flying up in surrender. A goofy, frightened look distorts Tony’s face. Peter snorts at it. Bowing over to grab up the sausage he’d lost, he bites it in half on his way out the bedroom.

*

“What if we just,” Tony begins, joining Peter on their balcony, “come out with it. With us, you know: the whole marriage thing.”

Peter holds his breath. The argument Tony incites is thus smothered.

“I know we’ve talked about it. I know your concerns.”

“We can’t,” Peter says simply.

“Pete. Hear me out.”

He follows Peter back inside. The boisterous song of the city is clipped when Tony shuts the glass, and Peter turns to face him, arms crossed.

“Just because they know I’m married to you doesn’t mean they’ll know you’re Spider-Man.”

“You’re thinking like a madman.”

“I am a madman.”

“If someone decides to come and attack me, in our home, I’m gonna defend myself. They’ll figure it out, and then everyone will know. It—it’ll be—”

“What we asked for.” Tony stands before Peter. “What we signed up for. It’s what we agreed to: better or worse.”

“And that’s all very romantic, Anthony, but we promised. You _promised_ me, before we left.”

When Tony reaches a hand to Peter as Peter’s voice cracks, Peter pulls away, clearing his throat.

“I’m not admitting to it. We said we wouldn’t do that, that our lives depend on this secret. I didn’t build that thing in your chest to watch you die so soon because someone wanted to hurt me by hurting you.” Peter exhales all the air stored in his body. “I’m gonna stay at my loft.”

“I forbid it.”

“We don’t have a choice!”

“My birthday’s next week. I’m not—no. Absolutely not. You’re gonna stay here. You’re gonna be with _me_.”

“ _Fuck_ , you’re stubborn.”

“Look who’s talking.”

Peter flicks his gaze over Tony. He shakes his head when Tony closes the space between them once more.

“Is that a smile I see?” Tony asks. “Right there. In the corners.”

“Shut up.”

“It’s twitching.”

Peter laughs, letting himself be caught in Tony’s arm. Tony swings him so Peter’s side is against Tony’s front, then lands two spanks upon his ass.

 _“‘Cut me off again,’”_ Tony mocks.

“You were making me mad.”

“Get over it. You’re stuck with me till we’re dead.”

When Tony frees Peter, Peter gives his own set of smacks. Tony rubs his backside, wincing.

“Don’t go acting like you can’t take it,” Peter teases, though the concern that flares in his eyes is blatant enough. “So I was thinking….”

“About?”

Peter joins Tony on the couch. “Our plan. To explain our relationship.”

“The ‘adoption’ thing? Think you’re a little too old for that now, kid,” Tony says, a laugh wheezing out of him.

“God, Tony. Remind me to check the arc reactor later, think it’s making you lose your mind.”

“Okay. See? Totally serious now.”

Peter stares at Tony and Tony stares at Peter and Tony laughs again, clutching his middle. It’s then that the decade spent sharing intimate quarters with Tony spits out at Peter a small, yet vulnerable fact on his husband:

Tony buries fear beneath humor.

It isn’t the usual snark characteristic of his person, but spells of behavior spiced with frenzied excitement. Happening two years in, when Peter mentioned helping the city, it’s maximized since, though visits are infrequent. They come, nonetheless, piercing Peter through his heart. That Tony can be so frightened is a disturbing thing for Peter. It eclipses all feelings that are his own.

He edges close. His tone is sympathetic when he murmurs, “Anthony….”

But Tony ducks his head and shades his eyes with a work-worn hand. Now discovered, he appears equally, openly shy before Peter.

“I’m sorry. I scared you, Tony, fuck….” He grips the back of Tony’s neck and pulls him near enough that his lightened hair presses Peter’s chest. “I know, my love. I know you didn’t like that.”

“I just wanna protect you, kid. That’s all I….”

“Shhh, you’re fine. It’s fine.”

Gulping back the sob colliding with the back of his throat, Peter hugs Tony’s head in his arms. He kisses his hair and nuzzles it deep, feels as Tony embraces him— _finally_.

“It’s okay,” Peter reassures in a whisper. “You don’t have to be the strong one every time. I love you. Do you trust me? To be strong?”

“You know I do, Pete.”

“Okay. Okay. Take your time.”

“I should’ve made sure we were safe.”

“No, everything’s safe. I’ve got you and _nothing_ bad’s gonna happen.”

The tender words are seeming to let loose a stopper pressed into Tony, for his tears are sliding from Peter’s chest to his lap; still bare.

“No one’s coming for us,” Peter whispers. “I’ll kill them if they do. Torture them, even, to make them know it wasn’t right. You believe me, don’t you? Because I would. I _will_. No one can touch you, or me.”

“How…. How would you torture them?”

“I’d use my web to cut a limb at a time. Or maybe just one limb, and then their head to finish it, so they wouldn’t bleed out before I did.”

“Perhaps just the head,” Tony says.

“Yeah…. Perhaps just the head. So I’d take my web”—Peter’s voice is silk now—“as I stood behind them, and I’d bring it across their neck. Then I’d saw so precisely through it, make a clean and perfect slice. Even the cops would be impressed when they found it. Their head would come off so good and they’d never get to hurt us. Would you like that?”

“I _would_ like that.”

“Good. That’s what I’ll do. If it comes to it—which it won’t, because we’re safe.”

Tony’s sobs have quieted by this point. His cheeks are warm and Peter hums when he kisses them. Tony shakes his head and drops a pat to Peter’s knee, blowing out breath, gazing about.

Peter’s voice is kind. “You needed that cry, didn’t you?”

“More or less.”

“Stay here.”

Leaving to grab some shorts from their bedroom, Peter returns through the kitchen with cold water. Tony accepts it, taking in half the glass in a go. He purses his lips while avoiding Peter’s gaze.

“We haven’t had to think about it,” Peter begins in a delicate manner, “because we’ve been home, for the most part. And that’s _fine_. We knew it’d take some adjusting, coming back to the city. Coming back to...everything.”

“Hm.”

“But we have a plan for this. We didn’t just...come back here without a plan. And we have to use it now. We have to be serious. To protect it. The secret.”

Tony is quiet. Peter, still, can hear the mechanics grinding in Tony’s skull.

“We’re partners in science working together to restore innovative technology that decayed after the...” Peter shifts, wets his throat before finishing with, “...event.”

“Yes. I remember this scheme of ours. A good, one, too.”

“The best we had.”

“Dinner dates can be explained as ‘business meetings’ and ‘research trips’ are always vacations away in my husband’s pert and perfect little ass.”

Peter thaws. He nods, relieved that Tony is coming back to himself, if only in lewdness, which Peter much admires.

“Yes,” Tony repeats with restored assuredness. “We do have a plan. A good plan. And here we were, getting worked up over nothing.”

“They’re just rumors. No one knows, like you said,” Peter consoles. He wants to believe this badly now, if only to comfort Tony’s worried heart.

*

Deceit does not succeed without its arsenal of appearances, the things that make the lie most believable. “A new bank account,” Tony declares when Peter’s scrubbing suds through his hair. “It’s best to keep things separate, I’ve learned.”

*

At the bank, Tony sits cross-legged in a chair. Peter stands before him wearing a stiff set of shoulders and matching jaw.

“Wrinkles, love,” Tony reminds. His voice pours warm and low from behind a magazine, meant only for Peter, but they can’t afford these mistakes.

“I’ll be more careful. Mr. Stark.”

Peter’s teeth pinch his lower lip. When Tony clears his throat, Peter knows his message was received.

There are some things in the room which distract Peter from the bore of it all, like that woman approaching the glass with her petulant daughter, the man penning digits onto various slips at a counter, and the set of guards, which tour the space with jaws as set as Peter’s had just been, but there’s something more—an undercurrent, perhaps—which doesn’t allow Peter to feel at ease.

“I’m still getting used to this,” he says, facing Tony now. “Being so out in public, _all_ the time.”

He pivots back around before Tony gives his response, hating to have his back to a crowd. At least he has the cuffs boosting his confidence. Both wrists are embraced by technology which summons the Iron Spider. As Tony, too, is suited up in secret, he should relax, he knows. He _can_.

When invited to seats at a desk in a private office, Peter sits in the chair nearest the door. He sees Tony’s furtive glance before he looks ahead, but Peter is still preoccupied by the _feeling_.

“So you’re here to open a new business account with us today,” the suited gentleman across from them says. “And you are _thee_ Tony Stark, correct?”

“The one and only.”

“I thought I recognized you.”

Tony sucks his teeth, ticking his head to the side in that way he does. “Media’s just doing their job. Probably hasn’t seen this much excitement since….”

Peter’s fists curl in his lap. They don’t discuss the Snap, yet twice in one day, Peter has been reminded.

“Not from the news or anything,” the representative clarifies. “You spoke at my high school graduation. Brooklyn Tech, the year before the world went to…. Sorry.”

The man ducks his head and laughs a sheepish fucking laugh, right in front of Peter, blushing and everything. This whole display is for Tony, from the way he lifts his eyes to the shift of his tone. He hasn’t acknowledged Peter since he put his ass in the chair and Peter expects the neglect to continue.

A high school graduate.

Heat fills Peter up to his hair. Meanwhile, he awaits the status of his GED, though he has mastery as an entire biophysicist.

He leans forward in the chair. It creaks. The professional’s green eyes turn to Peter.

“We’d just like to open the account,” Peter says. The entire sentence is full of blatant bitch.

“Right.” The man clears his throat. _M. Rossini_ , the name tag reads. “I didn’t get your name, you’re…?”

“His—”

“Partner. Business partner,” Tony amends, flashing Peter with a glance of caution. “But yes, we are in a bit of a hurry. Other engagements, you know how that can be.”

Rossini smiles and nods and sucks up Tony’s voice, that way Tony _speaks_ while conditioning a person to meet his needs. That voice had touched Peter’s ears just last night and he shouldn’t be made to sit here and share it.

“You’ve got some accounts with us already but I just want to go over a few things with you, Mr. Stark.”

“Of _course_ ,” Tony soothes. Really working the guy.

Peter tunes it out. _M. Rossini_ unhinges Peter. He’s not even Tony’s type, with his curly hair clipped close to his head and the beard spread heavy about his face. Too muscular, too. And probably too tall. Peter nearly smiles in satisfaction, knowing the stranger would fail to intrigue his husband.

It’s then that Peter’s ears begin ringing. The hairs float up on his arms, reaching for an unseen source. He turns his head in time to see the figure at the door, obscured by the glass, a gun in hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do enjoy my Peter with attitude and an ability to step into his dominance. He is _quite_ capable of growing into being a switchy character canonically—that’s my belief, at least—and I am bursting with excitement at what is to come in Exhumed.
> 
> In other news: are you prepared for drama?


	4. Bleed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A spoiler-free zone doesn’t ensure an angst-free zone. I intend to keep you on the edge of your seats. With love, of course. <3

Tony hasn’t recovered from the moment _his husband_ tumbled on Peter’s teeth. He’d have said it. Peter’s jealousy would have fucked them both. Tony smiles, nods at the man across the desk, feeding him niceties all while planning a proper spanking for Peter. So when the door creaks open—noiseless as it is—Tony is unprepared for what he sees.

Peter stands, blocking the flash of metal, putting his body between the stranger and Tony.

“You don’t wanna do this,” Peter says.

“You _want_ me to blast your shit off?” Tony hears the gunman ask. He spares a moment to see that Rossini’s hand is floating back, away from his desk phone. “That’s right. You sit still and quiet like the handsome bitch you are and let adults speak. And that goes for you, too, tiny twink. I’m here for the Stark.”

Tony imagines Peter blurting out, _“I_ am _the Stark,”_ defiant, yet true, soaked in Spider venom. He doesn’t say it. He flexes his hands instead, rolls his cuffed wrists, preparing, perhaps, to call on the suit.

“I said”—the gunman steps into Peter’s space, towering well over him, and Tony’s feet lift without him knowing until they land him two inches from Peter’s back—“you, too. _Boy._ ”

“Don’t be a bully,” Tony says. “You wanna talk to me, let’s talk.”

“Okay, Iron Man. Okay.”

But whenever this mysterious, desperate creature shifts a leg, Peter is quick to predict where he’ll move. He doesn’t allow the gunman and Tony to meet, to Tony’s horror, and Tony doesn’t know when last he blinked, so afraid he is that he’ll miss the moment that triggers the man into action.

“Pete,” he tries. “Let me.”

“Yeah, Pete. _Let Daddy._ ”

“Give me the gun,” Peter says.

The gunman laughs. A distinct sound—the safety being shifted—rakes through Tony’s ears and into his heart.

“You really wanna protect that pussy behind you? He _left_.” And _left_ comes out on an airy, wicked laugh. “Took his billions and pretty little metals and got the fuck out. A dumb good idea, if you ask me. All that wealth. Who _would_ want to share it?”

“We all did what we had to do. Just like you feel you’re doing now,” Tony says. “But hurting anyone here won’t _get_ you what you want.”

“Just you. I’m only here to hurt you. See, there’s only one way to really fuck up someone like you, Iron Man. _The pockets._ ”

“You want money, I’ll give you money. Just point the gun away from”— _my husband_ —“the kid. I’ll have Casanova here plug it right into your account. _Today_.”

The gunman laughs. His shoulder jumps; there’s sweat between his brows. Tony contemplates the time it’d take to wait for the suit, if it’d come quick enough for him to shield Peter. Or, his greatest fear: would the armor entice the gunman to react?

Tony’s heart produces wild and juicy music, and the music sticks in his ears; a haunting song.

*

_“I don’t feel so good.”_

__

__

_“You’re alright._ ”

_“I don’t—I don’t know what’s happening.”_

*

“We can set up the transaction _easily_ , sir. If you already have accounts with us, I—”

The gunman’s weapon swings to Rossini and Peter darts in the way of it.

 _“Don’t,”_ Tony snaps. “Peter. Alright. _Listen_ , we can get you all the money you want, just get the gun out of the equation.”

“Then where’s the incentive?”

Tony’s neck strains when he says, “I’m wearing the _suit_. You’re outmatched here.”

“Yeah?” The gunman’s eye’s rove over Tony. “Where?”

“Just take the _money_ ,” Peter says.

“Kid. I’ll handle this.”

“Wait. Is this—is this your _son_?”

Tony stretches his sweaty hands. They curl into fists as he looks between the black, glinting metal and Peter, who’s off to the right at the edge of the desk, shielding the consultant with his body.

“But you didn’t have a kid. He looks too old to be your _kid_. Wait…. The news. Didn’t the news…?”

“Do you want the money or not?” Tony asks.

The gunman regards Peter, slimy and vicious. “This is _him_. This is who the news said—”

Tony knocks his wrists together, hearing the clank of bracelets. Nanomachines bloom from the center of his chest, spreading his pecs and shoulders with the armor. It crawls along his fingers, in the same way, circles his ankles, and the helmet enhaloes the top half of his head.

“Fuck it,” the gunman says. He swings the gun toward Tony. Peter leaps over the desk as shots cannon out.

*

_“I’m sorry._ ”

*

Peter crashes into Tony. He strikes metal, as Tony’s nearly covered now by the suit, and Tony crouches as Peter slides to the floor.

The gunman is frozen across from them, eyes big and black as he sees what he’s done. Bubbles of blood are spewed from Peter’s mouth as he coughs against the bullets and heat and hurt in his lungs.

Tony doesn’t think. He stands with Peter slumped at his feet and directs the armor’s energy into the Unibeam.

The blast shreds through the gunman, as well as several walls. A tunnel of dust and space is left in its wake.

Without a word to Rossini—without so much as a blink toward any casualties—Tony scoops up his husband and jets back-first out of the wall of windows behind Rossini’s desk.

Civilians scream in the street when he and Peter emerge outside in a spray of glass. Tony swings to the side. The rockets under his feet shoot him into the sky.

“FRIDAY, show me the nearest hospital,” Tony says, the words rough as sand, his throat feeling closed.

“Right away.”

“Call them,” Tony says. “Tell them we’re coming.”

“Don’t—no hosp-hosp—” Peter coughs and grips his middle. His shirt is ruined with wrinkles; with blood. _“Tony.”_

“It’s okay. Peter. _Pete_. It’s okay, stop talking, baby. You’re okay.”

“I can’t—”

But Tony is clutching Peter to his suit as if he were small, a child—a child of his own—someone so helpless and pure and fuck, he’s _bleeding_ too much. He _won’t_ hear the plea on Peter’s lips. Damn the identity; the matrimonial _secrets_.

“Hold on, Pete. We’re almost there.”

Peter lurches. He reaches for his own wet mouth. If not for the force of the wind whipping against them, Tony would see Peter’s tears. He’d witness them falling and getting lost in the air.

“I see it.” And tears are also present in Tony’s throat. “I—baby. We’re almost there.”

Power kicks up in the rockets.

“Pete?”

Tony looks down at his husband. His head is lolled to the side and rests against Tony’s chest. Tony stops. He hovers mid-air. The helmet’s face dissolves.

“No hospitals,” Peter rasps as a sob jerks Tony, who leans and kisses Peter’s sticky lips.

While Tony lands, a crowd awaits outside the ER entrance. Tony’s mask opens to reveal his blood-streaked face, but his eyes are so wet, he can barely make out the team through smears of lights. The boots of his suit make contact with the ground. In an instant, Peter is ripped from his arms.

_The most precious cargo._

__

__

_The last remaining wonder of the world._

Tony feels robbed, like someone _stole_ Peter, like he’s letting Peter be taken again in the wind—defenseless dust.

Peter strains and Tony staggers forward.

“Don’t let them take me!”

“ _Please_. Don’t fight.”

“Mr. Stark!”

“Don’t fight,” Tony begs, voice wrecked. The suit, in its liquid way, evanesces from sight. “It’s okay. Pete. I promise, they’re just gonna help. Pete, _please_. Don’t—you’re hurting yourself.”

*

Tony follows the stretcher until he can no longer. “I don’t wanna go in the dark!” he hears Peter call.

*

With a sob, Tony collapses in the bathroom. His attempt to catch himself on the counter fails, though his legs are noodles now and it wouldn’t have mattered. He thinks of Titan, how Peter had staggered into Tony’s arms. The boy hadn’t wanted to go at that time, either.

Twice. Tony has failed him twice. He watches his tears touch public tile, imagines Peter so terrified “Mr. Stark” had burst from mouth the same way it had a decade ago.

“Call Happy,” he tells FRIDAY. “Happy…. Tell him….”

Tony wakes to a stranger touching his shoulder.

“Are you hurt?”

It’s a woman’s voice. Tony’s eyes blink open. Tears drip out.

“Hey,” she says, soft. Kind. She’s rubbing his arm. Tony allows her to help him sit upright. “How—why’d you come in here?”

“I didn’t….”

“It’s okay.”

Tony remembers at once: the bank; the Unibeam; the blood. Someone had made Peter _bleed_. Someone….

“My husband….”

“Oh….” That lilt to her voice, like she’s just realized something. “You’re Tony—Iron Man—? It’s—okay. It’s okay. I won’t—let’s get you….”

She helps Tony to his feet, though he’s heavy enough that her aid wouldn’t have mattered had he not lent his assistance. His hands slide into the sink and activate water. The woman sets down her purse as he splashes his face.

Blood.

 _Peter’s_ blood.

The taste passes his lips, stains loosening under the liquid. He dares to take a swallow. Heat snakes over his skin as it—as Peter—fills his belly.

“The shooting,” she says in a conspiratorial voice. “At the bank. It’s all over the news.”

Tony takes his time scrubbing the blood from his face with a wad of paper towels. “Are they looking for me?”

“Well. _Yes_.”

Tony sniffs.

“But not...like _that_ , I don’t think. It’s more for the boy.”

“He’s a man.”

“Your husband. Right.”

Tony looks her over in the mirror when she lowers her eyes, a sign of respect, he feels—an offer of privacy. She’s...lovely. Red hair and freckles. A comely cardigan and high-waisted pants. The yellow shirt beneath the sweater sweeps around her breasts that are so plump, he wonders if they’re storing milk.

“You can’t tell anyone,” he says. Though, does he care? He wants the world to know now. He wants the world to see that this is what happens when you fuck with the one he loves.

“No, no. Of course.”

Tony sighs. Feeling heavy and worn, he stares at his reflection and worries his birthday will make him 59 instead of repeating the year of 52.

*

“Tony….”

Another woman.

But he knows this woman.

Shifting in his corner seat where he’s clothed in gift shop gear, Tony sees beyond his shades—

“Pepper?”

Happy is behind her. The room becomes small. His chest constricts.

“Tony,” she repeats in the same soothing manner.

He shakes his head. His hands come up to hold on to his shoulders, one crossed over the other, his bracelets scraping.

“I’m so sorry,” Pepper says. She kneels at Tony’s side and rests a slender hand upon his knee. “Have you heard anything?”

“I shouldn’t have brought him. I should’ve had him stay home, handled it alone.”

“This isn’t your fault,” she says.

“He’s just—he’s 26. He hasn’t even lived, he….”

When he sways, Happy and Pepper both catch his arms.

“C’mon,” Happy guides. “We got you. That’s it, alright, Tony. It’s okay.”

“He can heal. He heals fast, he can come back from anything. He came back to me, right? Came back from the dead, from the portal, the realm, _the place_ ”—Peter’s words—“I mean, what’re we fretting over, here? If he can heal from the Snap, I….”

He’s babbling. Happy and Pepper exchange looks of concern.

“He can heal,” Tony repeats. “He can heal. He wouldn’t have done—he wouldn’t have made me _watch it_ again if he didn’t think he could heal. He wouldn’t—he wouldn’t _do_ that.”

*

A surgeon approaches Tony, Pepper, and Happy however many hours later it is. All Tony knows is that it’s black beyond the windows and that Pepper and Happy both have left at different times to eat different meals. Tony hasn’t eaten. He hasn’t even sipped water. The last drink he had was from the bathroom sink, spiced with Peter’s superhuman blood.

*

Two hours after the surgeon’s most reassuring visit, Tony’s allowed to visit Peter alone. “Spouse,” he’d said when asked his relation to the patient, and the word had spilled heavily from his mouth. It’s not like Peter’s files don’t spell out a surname of Stark and that Tony, himself, isn’t Emergency Contact.

Perhaps they didn’t think things through. Perhaps the marriage will damn them. Perhaps Peter will damn him for bringing him here, to begin with, for telling these strangers what they are to each other.

Then he sees him.

There’s Peter, and at his right, a nurse.

Tony’s eyes and throat are wet in an instant.

“Hi,” Peter says. His voice is the softest, sweetest little sound. Tony chokes. Three nurses rush to catch him when he sways in place at the entrance, helping him upright again, murmuring in encouragement.

The sound of the curtain being reeled shut behind him makes Tony feel less exposed. He takes a step forward; steadies himself on the stretcher.

For an eternity, he stares down at Peter, enjoying the mere image of his husband taking breath into his body. He relishes the tears that drain from the outside corners of Peter’s coffee eyes because he’s _alive_. He’s _alive_ , doing basic, living things. He’s alive and he’s here and Tony rocks with a sob.

“It’s okay,” Peter says in his hair when Tony curls over against him. His hand slips in to scrub Tony’s scalp. “Don’t cry….”

“I just—I just lo-love you.”

A childlike wail breaks out of Peter then. He curls his arms under Tony, hugging his head as he’d done on the couch what seems like eons ago. The nurses behind them are quiet; inspecting. Tony swallows spit and salt and sighs.

“We’re gonna take him to his room now, dear,” a nurse later says. From the thickness of her words, she’s weeping, too.

Tony is escorted before Peter, placed in the room to wait for Peter’s arrival.

**Today** 2:23 AM

_They’re bringing him now  
Freaking out_

_Send him all our love.  
We’re here for you, Tony. Always._

*

After Peter’s placed on the bed and the nurses exit the room, Tony approaches Peter, whose eyes are soft. He leans and lays his lips on Peter’s forehead, between his brows, then kisses his nose, and at last, tastes his lips.

They taste each other many times before Tony lifts his head. He looks at Peter’s chest, which is clothed in the gown.

“I’m gonna heal,” Peter says.

“I know.”

“You have to get me out of here.”

“Tonight? How quickly will you do it?”

“I’ve—I’ve never been shot,” Peter says, tensing as Tony pulls down the sheets and lifts his gown to see his bandaged chest. “I dunno, two days? Three?”

“You were shot five times. Your lungs are all ripped up, the doctor said they don’t know how you’re _breathing_.”

Peter quiets. Tony rubs his thigh, avoiding the flaccid cock that sleeps against it.

“...Are you mad?”

“Pete….”

“Because I couldn’t let you get _shot_ , your suit wasn’t on yet.”

Tony hasn’t heard Peter sound so desperate and young since…. The shrill spike of his voice tugs Tony’s heartstrings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m in such a state of melancholy right now, not being able to see End Game until next Saturday, dodging spoilers, and healing from surgery, so here goes another chapter because I can’t stop fucking writing and can’t keep the angst out of my fingertips.
> 
> Forgive me for putting our beloved boys through so much but doesn’t it hurt so good so often, like just admit it. Plus so much tender comfort is coming and so much tender sex and ugh. I’m going through something and it can only be made right by this fic.
> 
> <3


	5. Peonies and Sun-dried Fruit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Moonday! Let’s start the week with something sweet.

_“What kind of spider are you, Peter?”_

_It was a Wednesday. The sun was cooking Peter’s back, moist with UV protectant, and Tony was cooking a vast array of meat on the grill. The air was seasoned with summer in the very best way. It was the summer Peter would turn 18._

_“Did you see it, I mean? When it bit you?”_

_“I did.”_

_“Black widow? Brown recluse?”_

_“It was small. Colorful,” Peter said. His voice was as lazy as he looked._

_“I’ve got nothing.”_

_“A jumping spider. I’m a jumping spider.”_

_Peter could hear Tony holding in his laugh as steak sizzled beneath the meat fork. He whipped his head to see his older lover and pinned him good with a pair of accusing eyes._

_“It’s just,” Tony began, “fucking cute. You’re already—”_

_“Tiny.”_

_“—tiny. And then the little colors on them. And how they leap, I mean, you look_ just like _one now that we have this sensitive data.”_

_“They’re also the most intelligent spider. Even more so than the daddy long legs.”_

_“Oh? Tell me more, buttercup.”_

_“And they’re excellent assassins. We, I mean. Me and them.”_

_“So you’re like family now, to the things.”_

_“Exactly.”_

_“Distant cousin, perhaps?”_

_“I was thinking more like a brother.”_

_“Ah.”_

_“Then there’s the eyesight. The eyesight is impeccable. Superior, even. That’s why when I was in the place, in the dark…. When the tricks would come, they were the only light, and the light was so sudden, this giant rush of sudden input, and it hurt. My eyes were so adjusted to the dark by the time I turned up here that the lights here, they...burned. They were just so_ constant _, not like the light in the place.”_

_Peter didn’t know why he was talking about it. He hated talking about it. Besides; they’d discussed it many times the past year, all random like this, helping them to better understand it; helping Peter as he continued to heal. The glasses Tony had built him had become paramount in this system. They grounded him in reality, unlike the place._

_“But I don’t wanna talk about that anymore. Or ever again.”_

_“You’d rather discuss your family. The dancing arachnids.”_

“Also,” _Peter continued, a bit of sass on his tongue, “they’re_ —we’re— _extremely sensitive to vibration and movement.”_

_That night, Tony had sat Peter on top of the washing machine. Peter’s face was ugly with tears as he gripped the edge of the hardware. His cheeks were bright and hot and his moans were specific._

_“How long will it take you to cum?” Tony asked._

*

Peter opens his eyes to a room full of flowers. Petals carpet the floor of what are already extravagant quarters, while baskets of fruit and cheese and chocolates cover what little room there is left on each surface. Amongst this beautiful mess is one sleeping husband, curled into the couch beneath the windows.

Peter flexes his hand stuck with the IV. He licks his dry lips before feeling his teeth with his tongue. They can stand to be brushed. He also craves a shower.

Swallowing, he tests for the pain his breathing tubes had given him and finds that his healing has wiped it utterly out. His only problem now is deciding what he’ll taste amongst the peonies and sun-dried fruit.

Tony begins to stir. This, of course, distracts Peter from eating. His soft gaze rests against his husband as he digs his way from under a massive blanket.

The arc reactor begins to glow brighter as Tony wakes, a white-blue luminance under his shirt. For such a thin contraption, it’s also a prominent one, merging clean energy with the crystals used in High Priest Aaron’s Breastplate. Peter thinks of its chrysolite, for physical health and strength, and heliodor for its youthfulness and vitality. That mere fraction of the magick keeping Tony’s cells new makes Peter’s heart flutter its wings.

Peter’s lips turn up as he watches Tony stuff his mouth with treats. This is who he chose for the upcoming decades. This is what’s in store for Peter’s future.

“Satisfying?” Peter still sounds logy.

“Not as satisfying as you, sweet face.”

“What’s in your mouth?”

“Deliciousness. Ah, prunes,” Tony adds, fingering through another basket. “Would you like some, dear?”

“Absolutely not.”

Tony knows what Peter _does_ want. He stands, grabbing a dark, twisted handle of one basket packed with various chocolate gifts in gold foil.

Peter sighs. “You love me.”

“As much as I love myself.”

He sits beside Peter in the nearby chair. Unwrapping a chocolate speckled all over with nuts, Tony extends his hand to Peter’s lips.

Peter bites.

“That’s it,” Tony says, seeing the richest caramel dribble out.

Peter nods, chewing the half he’s taken. “Share with me,” he says when he’s finished.

And the request is so tender, so painfully innocent, that Peter sees Tony’s eyes glaze as he pushes what’s left in his fingers over his tongue.

They do this six or so times, Peter taking fruit with his chocolate, or chocolate with his cheese, and Tony sucking Peter’s fingers and lips.

“Look at me,” Peter says when the decadent breakfast concludes.

Tony does. The mood tilts at once.

“I have never loved you more than I did when I thought I was dying for you.”

Peter waits, watches as Tony shuts his eyes and shakes his head as if Peter has uttered a curse he must free himself of.

“But you knew,” Tony says. “You knew you would heal. That you weren’t _actually_ going to die.”

A pause.

“I didn’t.”

“Pete.” Tony’s head is shaking again. “C’mon….”

“Don’t let it scare you.”

Silence.

“Come closer.”

Tony flicks over his nose. His jaw is clenched. He sits a little while before he pushes away from his seat and leans over Peter.

Peter curls his hand in Tony’s shirt. With ease, he drags him further down so that Tony’s ear rests against his lips.

“I’m going to fuck you.”

A more abrupt shift happens now, so much that Peter can all but see the heat coming off of Tony.

“Yeah,” Peter says.

“But your wounds….”

“Healed. By your birthday.”

Tony slides his hands across the covers. Now that he has Tony in a more receptive space, he frees the shirt, reaching for his nape.

“I want you to get the silk.”

_“Peter.”_

“Have it all cleaned and pressed for me to tie you up in. And no plugs, Tony. I’ll open you myself, with my body.”

Tony gasps.

“Like _always._ ”

He nods.

“I love you,” Peter says. “Don’t be upset.”

“I’m not upset.”

“Tell me you’ll go get the silk.”

“I’ll go get the silk.”

Peter shuts his eyes and brushes his nose against Tony’s throat before letting him go. They part, meeting eyes. Tony, as expected, looks flustered— _wild_ —like Peter’s already folded him over the bed.

Tony returns to his seat in a far-off daze. He’s recalling, Peter imagines, thinking about the contrast of his scruffy face and demeanor with the long, thick strips of soft silk. They’re much unlike what Tony puts on Peter, what he likes to see Peter wrapped in when he tortures Peter’s hole with vibrating wands. Harnesses and buckles are preferred to panties on Peter. “Balances out your whole innocent look,” Tony’s said.

“Are you hard?” Peter asks as Tony recovers. When Tony tugs his pants so the fabric is tight on his leg, Peter sees the print against his thigh and hums, approving.

*

Pepper comes at 10 and Peter’s throat shuts and stings when he sees her.

“Ms. Potts….”

“Don’t strain,” and, “Easy, Pete,” zip out of her and Tony when Peter attempts to sit up straighter but fails, wincing. They both rush to his aid at each side of the bed, carefully touching him as they settle him down.

“I know,” Tony soothes. He’s a blur as tears begin to cascade from Peter. “I know, Pete. I’m gonna step out, okay?”

“And go where?”

“Just outside the door, so you can do this how you want. It’s okay.”

And he kisses Peter’s hand without sparing a glance toward Pepper, who’s going to make Tony cry, too, Peter knows.

“Just outside the door,” Peter calls after him as Tony rushes off. He swallows, watching the entrance as it shuts.

“Peter….”

His eyes burn. He shakes his head, staring at the ceiling as he coaches himself away from an outburst. But then Pepper touches him—lays a motherly hand on his chest—and Peter’s trembling lips fall open.

She lets him do it. Her other hand smooths his hair from his brow and sweeps it back, and she rubs his scalp like May used to do when he was upset and sobbing and ugly like now. He wants it to stop. Bubbles are at his nose and spit escapes his lips, but there’s so many tears that it all looks like one wet mess.

“I-I’m gla-glad,” Peter struggles out.

“I know, sweetie.”

The endearment only worsens his state. Pepper laughs. It’s soft. Kind.

“It’s okay, Peter. I understand. I felt the same way when I saw Tony, you know? But I had to be strong for him. For you. So imagine,” she says, dabbing Peter’s face with the softest tissue, “feeling all that for someone you haven’t seen in 10 years and sucking it in. I thought _I_ would need surgery.”

Peter’s laugh comes out crooked.

“I wanted to come see both of you when I found out back then, but Tony….” She sighs. Peter knows Tony’s ways, so she doesn’t have to say what they’re both thinking. “But we’re all here now.”

“Yes….”

“Can I sit?”

“Of cour-course. Please,” Peter says. He sips in a breath, watching Pepper walk around the bed, seeing May as Pepper’s shoes clack the floor.

She takes his hand. Peter gives it a faint squeeze, unable to feel out his strength, so drugged he is.

“I’m not Ms. Potts any more,” she says.

Peter’s thumb turns the ring on her finger. “Does Anthony know?”

“Yes. And I knew about you both, long ago. Happy has been...an intermediary of sorts.”

“I’m happy you’re”— _alive_ , he wants to say—“here. I’m happy you’re hap-happy.” His brow crinkles. “Are you?”

“Yes. I truly am.”

Peter hums. His eyes are heavy, but he darts them around the room at all his goodies.

“Would you like something sweet?” he asks. “There’s so much.”

“I told Tony this was overdoing it.”

As if summoned by his name at the precise moment it drops, Tony lets himself back in.


	6. Nightmare Narcotics

“He doesn’t like narcotics,” Tony says. Pepper, standing beside him outside Peter’s room, peers around at the streams of hospital traffic. “They give him nightmares. Make him _feel_ like he’s back there.”

“I understand. I do.”

“But he’s good, he’s…. He hasn’t said he’s had any so maybe, you know, _possibly_ he’s grown out of it.”

Pepper looks at him. Tony clears his throat. His hands fiddle around in his pockets.

“Good thing this isn’t awkward,” he says.

Pepper laughs. “Not awkward at all.”

“Not even the least, little bit? No?”

“Oh, Tony. You’re still you.”

“And you’re still perfect.”

“Goodness, stop.”

“In every way.”

They smile at each other. Tony takes her hand—the one that _glitters_.

“He good to you, this guy?”

“Absolutely.”

“And he knows if he fucks up, right? What’s gonna happen?”

“Your hands are full enough as it is, Tony. I still…. You two…. And him, he’s so….”

“Breathtaking,” Tony offers. The weight of the word drags them into silence.

Tony uses this time to scan their surroundings. Nurses and techs flit around, looking content—or pretending to be—while phones blare for attention at various counters. It’s tidy. Bright. Occupying a VIP floor ensures that the lie of perfection is kept intact.

“Come see him, Pep.”

“I know. I will.”

“At our _home_. Come see him at our _home_. Where we _live_.”

Pepper sighs. She pushes away a stray lock of hair. “Won’t that be weird?”

“Only if you make it. C’mon, Pep. He _cried_. He needs you, he—he needs a woman in his life. I can’t be that for him, you know _May’s_ gone. The kid’s dying for something like that, like what you gave him in there.”

“Were you _spying_ , Tony Stark?”

“He’s my _husband_.” Tony’s whisper is on fire. “Who’s been _shot_ , _saving me_. I have _every right_ to spy, for the rest of his life.”

“Tony, I—”

“And he _likes_ it.”

“Does he, now?”

“At times.”

She shakes her head.

“Seriously, Pep, we gotta coalesce here. For the sake of the kid. For the future.”

“Fine,” she concedes with a laugh. “God, Tony, you’re—”

His hand flies up for Pepper to give pause. FRIDAY says through his glasses, “Boss, he’s waking.”

“I know.”

“Still talking to yourself,” Pepper says.

“To the tech. He’s waking up, I gotta—”

“Boss. Something’s wrong.”

“I gotta—just _call_ me, okay?” Tony swings open the room door. “I mean it, Ms. Potts.”

“I’m _not_ Ms. Potts.”

He backs inside and watches the barrier swing shut between them, turns and hurries to Peter as he sits up.

“Someone was in here.” His eyes are wild and he’s swinging his head back and forth. “Someone—I _felt_ them, they were _right here_ , standing over me.”

“Easy, now. Okay? No one came in. I was right outside the door entire time.”

“Tony, I’m telling you. Someone was in the room.”

Peter slides his hand in Tony’s and squeezes it more than what’s comfortable. Tony lifts it. He staples a kiss across Peter’s knuckles and takes the chance to survey his arm with it closer to his face.

“FRIDAY,” he says, seeing the hairs sticking up, “show me the last 10 minutes in here, please.”

Tony watches the images stream across his lenses. There’s only Peter: asleep before jolting awake.

“There’s nothing here, baby. See?”

He slides the glasses on Peter, who has a revelation the instant the hardware touches him.

“Where’s Karen?”

“I have her. And your ring.”

Peter swallows. Tony kisses his hand again and watches as Peter views FRIDAY’s footage.

“I just...I _know_ what I felt,” Peter says after.

“I know.” He doesn’t want to suggest it and upset him, but Tony is sure that Peter’s thinking it, too. “Could it be the narcotics?”

Peter scoffs. He draws his legs up to his chest and a whimper—tinged with pain—tumbles out of him.

“Slowly,” Tony coaches. He adjusts the bed so Peter can rest his back.

“I wanna go home.”

“One more day.”

“ _To_ -day.”

“One more day, baby, that’s all it’s gonna take. That’s all it’s gonna take,” Tony says in Peter’s ear, and he rubs his shoulder and presses his forehead to Peter’s.

*

Peter doesn’t settle into the sleep he needs to heal, and by nightfall, Tony is watching him with the disapproving glare of a father.

“C’mon, Parker.”

Peter looks at Tony. He crosses his arms. “You only call me that when you want me to be _a good boy_.”

“I do want you to be a good boy. So you can _sleep_.”

“Well I don’t like to sleep anymore. In fact—”

“I don’t wanna hear it.”

“—I don’t think I’ll _ever_ sleep again.”

“And now, I gotta hear it.”

Peter narrows his eyes until they close.

“Don’t you give me that silly little face, I’m your elder. And you’re not too old for a spanking, kid, trust me. I’ll flip you over….” He remembers the bandages now. He sighs. “Baby, you gotta sleep. I wanna get you home, too, but five bullets went in, and I have to be _sure_ before I whisk you outta here.”

“But the place….”

“There is no more place.”

Peter bites his lip. Tony leans over him, his hands pressing the bed beside Peter’s legs.

“There is no more place,” Tony repeats. “If there were, could I do this?”

He kisses Peter’s throat. Peter’s legs shift under the covers.

“That feels pretty real, yeah?” Tony asks, sticking his lips just under Peter’s jaw.

“Yeah….”

“Would I be able to kiss you here, too?” His mouth touches the tender spot where neck and shoulder merge. “Or here?” Now, behind the ear.

“No, I—I don’t think so.”

Tony hums. Three kisses later, Peter makes a telling little sound.

“I think I could sleep with some help,” Peter says. His voice has changed. Tony knows why.

“Only good boys get that. You’ve not been so good here, have you?”

“I’m good all other times.”

“Right, right. Like just the other night, when you kept mouthing off? Good like that?”

Peter’s nod is fervent. “Just like that.”

Tony reaches under the covers where Peter’s dick is visibly chubbing up.

“I see bullets don’t stop this thing from working,” Tony teases. “Can’t go three days without getting fucked, can you?”

Peter shakes his head. He’s too enraptured by the way it looks as Tony’s hand slides back and forth and back, spreading his pre-cum down the length of him. Tony drags his fist toward the plump, leaking head and wrings it around him, jerking the sensitive tip.

Peter winces as he shoves into it. At the sound of discomfort, Tony slows and _tsks_.

“Sorry, sorry.” Peter swallows. His eyes beg for more.

“This isn’t what you want anyway, is it?”

“No, no.”

“Yeah, I know. Greedy for my cock is what you are. I don’t even have any lube. We may have to wait.”

“I can take it.”

“Yeah? And what if someone comes in here? Sees me balls deep, making you drool and whine?”

Peter’s mouth is ajar as the answer evades him. Tony can’t help himself. He kisses his husband.

“Be still,” he says, kicking off his shoes; getting his dick out. He slides on the bed on his back, careful while shifting Peter so that he can mount him. “That’s it, easy. Let me do it. Let me move you, Peter.”

“Okay….”

“Funny how your voice still gets soft when you want something from me.”

Peter nods, though he doesn’t look like he cares what Tony’s saying. He grimaces. He reaches for Tony’s shoulders.

“God, this bed is comfortable.”

Peter croons in agreement.

“So worth the large donations to keep us hidden. Ah, ah. Let _me_.”

“Sorry, I’m sorry.”

“I’m not gonna do it,” Tony says, “if you keep moving like this. You’re hurting yourself.”

“Okay.”

“Just relax….”

Peter groans. Tony angles his hips, punching his dick against Peter. It’s slippery, though it doesn’t part his cheeks.

“Am I heavy?” Peter asks.

“You’re _exquisite_.”

At the morsel of praise, Peter rasps a moan.

“I’m gonna be tender with you, Pete. Don’t expect to get fucked hard this time.”

“But I like—”

“I mean it. Or I’ll cut you off until you heal, I swear.”

Tony’s hands spread Peter apart. He squeezes, then presses the cheeks back together. Peter rolls his head against Tony’s shoulder, bumping his own fingers as he does it. They dig into Tony, squeezing as Tony touches the ring of muscle, and then his cock is there, pressing it open.

 _“Mmm,”_ Peter whines.

“I know.”

“Is it gonna get in?”

“Oh, yes.”

Tony massages the fleshy little mounds, thrusting up so he may test the state of resistance of Peter’s hole. The tip of his head is nestled in the most succulent warmth. He draws back again. He kisses Peter’s throat while it’s exposed.

“Look what you’re making me do, Peter.”

“It’s—it’s too tight for it.”

“I’m fucking it open, baby, hold on. That’s what you wanted, right?”

“Yes, yes. _Yes_.” Peter gulps up a breath. He clenches against the intrusion thick and persistent at his rim, hangs his head as he chokes back up the air he just got down.

Tony swears from the progress he’s achieving. The pre-cum is helping, this silky little veil that makes Peter soft enough to breach. He draws himself out the instant his tip is inside and Peter calls out, grasping at Tony’s arms; his hair.

He plays this awhile: rising up to give some shallow penetration, then drawing back, jabbing beyond the resistance the next time he seeks it. Each occasion Peter seals shut after Tony’s retreat, Tony feels Peter’s dick jump between them. He bites Peter’s throat as his nails bite Peter’s ass. When he sticks Peter again, both moan.

They kiss. It’s more tongue and spit than a sealing of lips, and the lips are only touched when Tony is nipping them. Peter’s breath shatters as he’s devoured like this. He slides against Tony, losing his grip on his biceps. At once, a hiss filters out of Peter. He catches himself on Tony’s chest before his own can impact it and Tony rubs his back, feeling the gown split further open.

“Is it hurting?” Tony asks.

 _“A little.”_ All breath and tears.

“Only I can hurt your hole like this.”

He grabs Peter’s thighs, lifting him to make more room for his thrusts. Peter’s head lolls against Tony’s neck. He moans as he starts getting fucked, slow and deep.

“Only I can hurt it,” Tony grits out, prying Peter’s ass open. “Letting me fuck you like this, where they can see it.”

“God, _fuck_.”

“Begging for us to get caught, knowing the door’s unlocked. Knowing what will happen if they catch us, but you don’t care about that, do you?”

Peter slaps his hand around the bar on the side of the bed and his IV tube raps against it.

“I know you don’t. You’ve _always_ been greedy. _Begging_ to be fucked everyday since I first put my dick in you. You’re _insatiable_.”

“You—turned me—out,” Peter moans.

He jabs Peter’s prostate for that. Pre-cum surges out, getting all over the front of Tony’s shirt.

“Ah!”

“Fuck, baby I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Let me see.”

“It’s okay.” Peter catches his breath and curls his toes as Tony checks his chest underneath the gown.

“I’m sorry. I was supposed to go slow, wasn’t I? Fuck, Pete….” He massages Peter’s waist, lying back so he can stare up at the beautiful face above him. “You get me so worked up in this little body.”

“Don’t stop….”

Tony rubs the small of his back. 

“Keep going, please. _Please_.”

“Greedy. Just like I said.”

He lifts Peter, then lets him down, impaling his body entirely.

“ _Yes_ , like that.”

“That’s gonna get you to cum?”

Peter nods. He seeks Tony’s mouth and the pace picks up between them again.

*

Peter cums in silence and Tony is watching him, moonstruck. Tony never tires of Peter, not even now, after a decade of mostly seeing only each other. His fingers brush gauze and medical tape as he counsels Peter down, whispering gentle words of encouragement.

“You’ve _gotta_ sleep,” Tony says when they’re done and he’s standing outside the bed as he was before they started.

“Okay, just…. No more nightmare narcotics.”

“I _swear_ it,” Tony says, though later, when Peter is cradled in slumber and a nurse comes quietly in, he nods and she fills his IV.

He falls asleep to watching Peter rest pain-free, but jerks awake when he feels they aren’t alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **This note contains no spoilers** but I finally saw _it_ yesterday and am currently still exhausted.


	7. Milk-livered

Peter drops the IV. Blood spills from the portal that small catheter made in his vein, wets the edge of his hospital gown and toes.

“Give me the hand,” Tony says, extending his own to his husband, who scoffs. “C’mon, you gonna be mad at me during our big escape? Spoil all the fun?”

“I _told_ you I didn’t want any more.”

“Punish me later,” Tony says.

“And you know what I also told you? This _crazy_ thing,” Peter continues, not letting Tony squeeze in a word, “about someone being in my room, standing right over me. And _you said_ —”

“Pete, I know what I said.”

Now Peter scowls, his arm stretched awkwardly out as Tony cleans and presses gauze to his hand. His free fingers lower to gather the waistband of his jeans. He maintains perfect balance as he dresses.

“Baby. I’m sorry. I should’ve listened to you, I always should.” He kisses Peter’s hand; the ring. “We’re so _fucking_ out of practice.”

Peter sighs because this, he knows. Stepping over the blood puddle, he allows Tony to catch him by the jeans. They kiss. Tony tastes like peach.

“We’re a little out of practice.”

“Just a little?” Tony asks as he grips Peter’s pants and draws them over Peter’s ass, up to his waist.

“Okay, maybe a lot.”

“And then there’s the press I’ve gotta do, for the _bank_.”

“What’s the news saying?”

“That I’ve abused the Heroes Shielding Civilians Act in going AWOL after making such a mess.”

“Tell them you were with me. The victim.”

Tony sniffs. He squeezes Peter’s waist and lowers his chin. “We’re gonna get you home first, away from this... _creep_.”

*

In the lobby, Peter’s hairs stand on end. He stops. Tony jerks to a halt two steps after.

“What? Is it them? Where?”

“Worse.” Peter turns away. Tony crowds close as Peter says, “There’s reporters out there. A lot of them. Someone told, someone said we’re here.”

Tony chances a look. Peter leans into him, waits for him to take the furtive glance.

“Fuck.”

“I’ll find another way out,” Peter says. “Go get it over with.”

“I’m not gonna _leave_ you here to—”

Peter’s already gone. He pushes on his glasses and fills his ear with a rounded plug so Karen won’t project into the hospital.

“Karen, I need to get home.”

“We passed the stairs 15 feet back, Peter. Get to the roof.”

“The _roof_?”

“Yes,” Karen says, her voice seeming to chime with satisfaction. “There’s a helipad. We can catch the next flight out.”

Peter would rather face the news reporters.

Racing up the stairs—resisting the reflex to spring to the top due to the cameras—Peter becomes out of breath at level 13.

“Wow,” he says, curved over, hands on his knees as he pants. “Am I this outta shape?”

“You were shot.”

“Right. Right….”

Across the right lens of the glasses, a box sprouts with an x-ray image of architecture.

“According to your unique rate of healing, Peter, you would have mended entirely 22 hours ago had you gotten more sleep like Tony—”

“Thanks, Karen.”

“That’s what I’m here for. Two more flights and we’re at the helipad. Looks like they’re leaving, better hurry.”

Swearing, Peter forces his body to ascend. He throws the door open that leads to the pad and steps out.

Blades chop the air. Peter’s belly rolls with astounding discomfort. “Is this really the only way?” he asks Karen.

“Yup.”

The chopper pulls from the ground. The door clicks shut behind him, locking him out, he’s certain, and now he faces the wide, green square and a fear of heights that even being in outer space hadn’t cured.

“Time for fun!” Karen beams.

“I’m gonna _shit_ myself.”

“You didn’t shit yourself on Titan. Hey, better run! Come on, Peter! Let’s—”

Peter rushes across the path that leads to the pad, crossing it just as the helicopter soars. Yards from the edge of the building, he yells to Karen, “Armor me up!” Nanites scramble to cover the span of his body.

The Iron Spider was all he had on his person at the bank, so he wears it now, the metal agleam in sunlight. The lenses of its eyes shrink as he launches himself through the wind. Webs spurt out and cling to the landing skids. Peter swings as the spider emblem fills along his chest, the suit now complete, his lithe body suspended. Propelling forward, he loses the rope and draws up his knees, blasting new lines of cord from both shooters.

They float over the city. Peter hasn’t seen this much of it since he was still in high school. It’s clearer now—less abandoned cars and stacked trash—but a hollowness stains the world of looming metal. It upsets him. The sound of the blades above sucks into silence as he hones in on a quiet street below. Slinging, he catches a web on a street light, then eases his way down to the pavement.

They’d been in Canada.

Tony had sheltered Peter, protected him from the monuments, from the pain of people who’d lost and lost and never would get back. He’d nourished Peter with water and trees and delicate nature sounds. He’d carefully mapped the roads they’d take into town. The food he’d put into Peter had been clean and cooked with love. He’d pounded Peter to sleep through spells of insomnia.

Peter drops to the curb and wills off the mask. Behind the armor, his heart has the pace of a rocket. He thinks of Titan now, though it’s lingered in his skull since up on the roof. He thinks of dust and the weight of Tony around him. 

Car tires crunch in his direction. They’re Tony’s. The Sense would’ve warned Peter otherwise. Resting his arms on his knees, he watches the ground, and then Tony’s shoes. His husband crouches before him, inspecting.

 _“You found me,”_ Peter struggles out. He’s sweating. His eyes are heavy with water as Tony commands the armor to fall. The rush of air on Peter’s skin refreshes him.

Tony touches his hair. “How’s my lamb, hm?”

“Not good.”

“No?”

Tony’s soft voice ruins Peter. He draws his knees together and folds his arms on them.

“Let’s get you home,” Tony says.

“I don’t wanna go back,” Peter sobs. “I don’t like it here anymore.”

“What don’t you like?”

“ _Everything._ The people everywhere and the news. And the _city_ , it just isn’t the same.”

“Nothing’s the same, Peter. We’re not even the same.”

Peter’s face becomes misshapen with grief. He lifts from his sheltering arms to look at Tony. “What are you trying to say?”

“I’m saying we’re adapting. Us; the relationship.”

“So you don’t like us anymore? That’s what you mean?”

Tony rubs Peter’s arms. Peter’s lips tremble as he searches Tony’s face, frightened of this transitory quiet.

“Remember when we talked about it? How it’d be when we left the house back there? Being apart at times, having separate responsibilities—all the things that’d _differ_ from our years alone with each other?”

Peter can only swallow spit and nod.

“That’s this. I mean, look at you. Taking bullets, going off without me having helicopter adventures. Didn’t even send me a _text_ ,” Tony teases, though Peter can hear the strain in Tony’s voice as he holds it together.

“So you still want to be married?” 

“Of _course_. Why wouldn’t I want you?”

Peter swallows again. He thinks back to the bank and the high school graduate. “So you don’t want someone like...M. Rossini?”

“Who the _fuck_ is M. Rossini?”

At Tony’s lack of memory, Peter perks up. “The guy. At the bank….” His face and neck sear with embarrassment. “He flirted with you, right in front of me.”

Tony laughs. His head hangs as he shakes it and he squeezes Peter’s calves, edging closer. “And still, you protected him. It was his body you first blocked from the line of a shot. And do you know why?”

“Why?” Peter’s voice is small.

“Because you’re a hero, Peter. That’s why we came back. That’s the _only_ reason why.”

“So you really didn’t like him?”

“C’mon, with that bitchy hair? I _abhorred_ him. And, hey. Who did I give my last name to? Hm?”

“Me, I guess….”

“You _guess_? Give it back then, since you’re uncertain.”

Peter laughs. He sniffs and his snotty nose bubbles.

“You’re fucking cute. You’re such a cute kid, you know that? Now come and help your old man up, my knees are killing me.”

*

At the penthouse, Peter undresses. Tony tests the temperature inside the sunken bath and his wedding ring dings the edge of the floor.

Tony has always been stunning. Now, he’s divine. His shirt is half-off, wet at the hem, stretched over a shoulder. The metal in his chest seems to blush. Peter stands bare, long cock semi-erect. He gathers it close to his body, in absolute awe of his husband, who hasn’t looked his way since they stepped in the room.

Despite this neglect, the silence comforts Peter and he settles knowing pampering will come. He’ll soon sink in this tub, steamed and silky with froth, and Tony will kiss him, touch him, make him feel safe. Beyond the comforts of home, where the world had scraped against him, Peter was given the opposite of that.

Tony triggers the jets and gazes at Peter. Peter’s eyes enlarge at sounds of bubbling.

“Is it up high?” Peter asks.

“It’s on the lowest setting. Just enough to relax you, nothing more.”

That’ll do. A low vibration to Tony doesn’t feel the same for Peter. His body would be stressed from a recurring need to cum and he’s already tired from crying and swinging and running up all those stairs. He walks to the side of the tub where Tony’s situated himself and dips his toes into the humming water.

“Mmm….” The jets’ vibrations flutter up his leg.

“See? I know your limits,” Tony says, facing Peter, the lower half of his body blocked by bubbles. “Come sit on the edge, soak your feet.”

Tony rubs Peter’s thighs the instant Peter takes his seat. The gentle vibrations draw a hum out of Peter.

“You did so good today.” Tony sweeps his thumbs across the healing marks speckling Peter’s chest. “I’ve never felt so proud. Of anyone.”

Peter swallows. He keeps his eyes down, watching Tony touch him where he’d been hurt. “I was scared,” he says. His voice is only just a little rough.

“I know you were. And me? Out there, swarmed by reporters, trying to watch you on the glasses and not miss a _thing_ as I answered their unending questions? Not scared at all.”

“Liar.”

“I was _terrified_.”

“I knew it.”

Tony kisses one of the bullet wounds. He grips Peter under his arms, keeping him still, and Peter likes that it makes him feel small and movable. When their lips slide together, Peter’s muscles relax. He hadn’t known he’d been tense until this instant.

“My fucking hero,” Tony murmurs. His forehead settles between Peter’s pecs and Peter cards his hands through Tony’s hair.

When Tony tightens his arms around Peter’s waist, Peter can better feel the quakes that travel throughout his husband’s body. He can’t quite tell if the water that hits his lap is from tears or Tony being wet from the bath. “It’s okay,” Peter consoles, one hand at Tony’s nape; the other, his back. “I’m still here.”

“And you thought I wanted someone as _milk-livered_ as M. Rossini. An insult.”

Peter barks a laugh. He’s smiling when Tony draws him into the tub. Driven to cling, his legs clamp Tony’s middle and he hugs Tony’s neck to keep himself up. Bubbles touch his cock despite his efforts, and they stick to his balls and ass, which Tony palms.

“Just you, Peter. All I see is you.”

And as Tony bends his knees so he and Peter can soak in their bath, Peter sees a shape on Tony’s shoulder, much like a bite.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After enduring such an intense full moon this weekend, I hope everyone’s Monday treated them well. It feels good to be back here with an update, my gosh, I’ve missed this story quite a lot. Also, I have a new tumblr account, and you can find me there @ dollmeatpie.


	8. Birthday Blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy birthday, Anthony Edward Stark. You are and always will be so very loved. <3

The bathroom falls still, and it’s eerie, like Peter’s supped the sounds out of the water. Tony feels the change as wholly as if it had come from his body. He tips back his head, searching Peter’s face.

“I didn’t—this isn’t mine,” Peter says. He stands. Their bath lashes around them and splatters the floor.

Tony’s heart skips, but when he shifts to stand, too, Peter grips his hair to keep him down.

“Pete? You’re _freakin’_ me out, kid, what’s it this time?”

“A mark, it…. Someone…. It looks like something _bit_ you, and it wasn’t me, this isn’t even how I do it.”

“One: your cock’s in my face.”

Peter sucks his teeth. “Anthony—”

“Two: impossible. It’s impossible. I’d _know_.”

Tony jerks up a shoulder to punctuate his conclusion, but Peter appears unaffected. And when he climbs from the bath, and his muscles flex with the work, Tony follows him with a lesser grace.

They head from the en suite bathroom, leaving a sopping floor and Tony’s wrinkled t-shirt crumpled upon it. Peter dries his balls and ass with a towel he’d snatched from the wall on the way to their bed.

“Where’s your glasses?” Peter asks. He hasn’t stopped yet. Tossing the towel, he rips up the sheets in his search. “Where are they? I know you had them in—”

Holding the tech in his fingers, Tony watches Peter flip and land. His husband takes the glasses without so much as a mumble of thanks, then scurries up the wall to stick on the ceiling.

Disturbed, Tony turns away. He stares at himself in the wall mirror, laced with Stark technology but lying dormant without a word of command.

There _is_ a bite.

The shape of a set of teeth are stamped in his skin, faint but for the contusions created by canines. He scrapes it with his nails and angles closer. The mirror shows that the mouth was large; powerful. But how could it be that this happened, that someone had left such a mark without him knowing, without him feeling the lips and tongue? The _teeth_?

In the background, Peter grouses audibly at his findings. It doesn’t encourage confidence in Tony, who’s beaten back a panic attack since the bank.

*

The projection is crisp, spread on the wall like a portrait. Light beams out from the glasses settled upon Peter’s face, and his arms are crossed, and he looks like a man—not the boy from _the house_.

*

A figure had loomed over Peter. It’d left as quick as it’d come, as though it’d merely been curious—like it’d visited Peter just to sniff the air around his bed and taste him in it. Tony sees the pale, inhuman complexion. He sees the build of a man, shoulders to waist. If something had happened to trigger mutations inside them much like with Peter, Tony supposes they somehow sensed Peter’s presence.

So then, why hurt Tony?

“It’s a vampire” Peter announces. And Tony knew he would, because he’s _Peter_ , whose pop culture obsession has already saved them once or twice. “It moves too fast for the camera, so I had to slow the footage and it was _literally_ only there for two seconds. _Two seconds_!”

He doesn’t know if Peter is wild with excitement or lividity. Neither can be good for Tony’s health. For a decade, Peter has openly missed the quests of Spider-Man, but Tony can’t bear to see his husband hurt again so soon. He turns, giving his back to Peter—who’d come to stand beside him—seeks a pair of shorts, some sweats, pajama pants.

“So why’d it bite _you_? It makes no sense,” Peter’s saying, so consumed he is with the footage.

Tony jerks on some joggers and bowknots the strings. There’d _be_ no footage had he not placed Karen on the hospital room accent table. There’d be no prompt for Peter to go full heroic. Again. Tony sits on the bed’s edge and scratches into the bite. Peter looks at him now. He whips off the glasses.

“Let me see it.”

“Pete….”

Tony can only sigh. Peter shoves his naked body between Tony’s legs and grips Tony’s hair to angle his head away from the bite.

“Don’t be upset with me, Peter, I didn’t….” He trails as Peter passes his tongue on the wound.

Robbed of words, Tony slams shut his eyes. He pins his teeth on his lip and lets Peter taste him.

The force behind the biting kisses that follow draw out a moan, a single, troubled noise blended with warmth. Tony anchors his hands around Peter’s waist to ground himself. When Peter sucks his ear, Tony hisses.

He’s given no time to savor the feeling of having a mouth at his lobe, as Peter grips him under the arms and tosses him to the center of their bed. _“Lord,”_ Tony swears, now a handsome splat amongst pillows. Peter is on him before he can lift on his forearms.

A kiss, violent and wet, shushes Tony. Between them, where the black pants are plump at the crotch, Peter’s fingers work loose the strings.

“Hey,” Tony soothes, or tries to. His mouth is crushed with a kiss blunt with teeth. “Pete, fuck…. Okay. Okay.” He lifts his ass to help the joggers get stripped.

Tony’s heart gallops when his cock springs out, the tip glossed and sticky at the slot. He croaks. His breath is thin and infrequent, like Peter is drinking it out of him, into himself. He grabs at Peter where he’s soft, yet strong, squeezing his waist; his ass; the backs of his thighs. The claiming kisses smother Tony until he’s floating in bed. He pries Peter’s cheeks fully apart.

Peter clenches, caught off guard by the touch. His mouth seeks the edge of Tony’s jaw.

“You’re so strong, Peter.” And he is, even more so now that he’s stressed. The praise is meant to remind Peter of that. “I love your body. God. Look at you.”

Peter doesn’t. Instead, he grips Tony’s chin. He turns Tony’s head away from the mark.

Tony fists the covers and sucks up air when Peter bites his arm, then his chest, and up, around the bruised and offending shape. Below, Peter’s dick head shoves against Tony’s hole. Tony snatches his wrist, tells him, _“Gently.”_

As though the word sobers Peter, he quails. Tony grips his waist to keep him seated.

“I didn’t say stop.”

“It _hurt_ you.”

“I know. But I didn’t say stop. I don’t want you to stop.”

*

A pause. “Let me get lube.”

Tony swallows. He releases Peter’s waist and circles a hand around his erection, the other wiping the pre-cum from his stomach. A good amount of stickiness now wets his palm and fingers and he strokes it into his chest, over his heart.

Peter returns with a bottle. Tony watches as Peter greases himself, a sloppy amount of liquid dripping between them.

“I’m not gonna hurt you,” Peter says. He’s already there—already _pressing_ on Tony. “I’m not gonna hurt you. I’m not. Ah, _Anthony_ …. How do you get so tight?”

“Gently, gently.” Tony all but begs. His pitch has changed and sweat is freckling his brow. “Be gentle with me. Peter….”

Peter’s slick hands find Tony’s throat. His eyes are hard on the bite. The print of the teeth are drugging for him— _poisoning_. And yet, Tony allows himself to be choked, to feel that thick vein thump Peter’s palm. He tenses his lower body when Peter curls himself toward it, sealing his entrance shut; an innocent reflex.

Their foreheads knock together. “Let me,” Peter grits out.

Tony winces, his thighs sliding apart. At the invitation, Peter licks and sucks Tony’s mouth, biting his lips, biting his cheek and jaw. Air bursts out from Tony’s chest when Peter nudges inside. His head settles just beyond the rim.

Peter freezes, perhaps to try not to cum, so long it’s been since last fucking Tony. Their teeth clank again—another breath sipped out—and Tony smacks Peter’s ribs once.

“I’m sorry.” Peter heeds the signal, voice sweet. The words dash across Tony’s throat, where a necklace of bruises is likely beneath Peter’s lips.

“You’re excited,” Tony says just as soft. “It’s okay.” His hands span Peter’s ass, a plump little cheek in each palm. He urges Peter forward. They moan.

Peter isn’t nearly as thick as Tony, but the stretch, still and all, is experienced. Between them, Tony strokes his cock from base to tip and milks out several dribbling droplets of his fluid. He bites his lip, tasting his own blood from Peter’s kisses. Peter sinks inside him in one thrust.

“Pete—oh, _baby_ , fuck.”

Peter rasps a curse and snaps back. His hips drive ahead to reconnect them.

It’s slippery, stinging sex that jerks the bed and bangs the wall. It’s striking and deep and Tony is spooked and turned on by it. He hugs Peter’s waist as Peter pounds him into the mattress. Like a bowl, it and the covers curve around them.

And it’s humid, and Peter hasn’t stopped to take a break, his staying power enough that surely, half an hour of ceaseless fucking has passed. Tony squeezes his eyes shut, taking it. No longer can he cage in his cries.

Peter stands on the bed. He drags Tony with him until Tony’s lower body peels from the sheets. Tony’s legs fall over Peter’s arms, swinging at impacts that make pre-cum jet on Tony’s chin and cheeks.

He watches, powerless, as Peter proceeds to impale him, and he feels the mighty hands supporting his back as though he weighs nothing. Each time Peter glances at the bite on Tony’s shoulder, he punches Tony’s prostate, abusing it.

And what can Tony do but howl and let himself be fucked, cock flipping, smacking against his belly? His chest and cheeks are flushed with the heat of pleasure, as well as embarrassment, being so exposed, so _used_.

“That’s it,” Tony coaxes. “ _Fucking_ kill me.”

Peter snorts. “Always trying to die.”

“I’m fucking—about to.”

*

Tony lies stretched on his belly, limp, his arms draped over his head, hiding his blush. Peter nuzzles the small of his back and slides up Tony’s leg until it bends. His tender ass opens.

“I’m gonna take you home,” Peter says before he eats it. He sucks and laps his own cum out of Tony.

*

Late in the night, Peter piles the Spider-Mobile with their things. Tony, dragging upstairs, locks down the penthouse. They watch each other through their separate glasses, comfortably silent. At last, Tony emerges, meeting Peter at his ride in the shadows.

“My love….” Peter’s face sweetens. He touches Tony’s throat, ringed with bruises.

“I don’t mind.”

“I got carried away.”

“I know.”

“And the bite, it just—”

“I get it. I’m not hurt, Peter.”

Tony cups Peter’s jaw, though he’s still too soft, too high to _squeeze_ Peter there. Instead, he brushes his thumb across Peter’s lips, then drags the lower one down, exposing teeth.

“I like when you fuck me,” Tony whispers. “I always have.”

Peter’s hum in response is almost inaudible.

They drive. The retro-reflective panels blot them from sight and the state of New York becomes a smear behind them.

*

It’s morning when the Spider-Mobile is left to cool outside their sacred home, camouflaged and armed with years-worth of tricks. Tony grabs the bags of clothes as Peter lifts their tech. They leave it all in a pile inside at the entrance.

He follows Peter’s lead to the bedroom. Tony’s eyes scorch at the sight of their things; their memories. He shrugs off his jacket and flings it to his right, hearing the juicy squish of leather as it smacks into the wall.

Peter, at the windows, sighs. He shoves his hands in his pockets, a contemplative figure as Tony approaches.

“I want kids,” Peter says. “Here, with you.”

Tony hides his face in Peter’s hair.

*

They tangle together in bed in their traveling clothes and sink in sleep. When Tony wakes again, it’s because he smells cheeseburgers.

“Happy birthday, Anthony Edward Stark,” Peter says. He reaches to grab the back of Tony’s neck and kisses him twice, tasting of salt. When they part, he dangles a brown bag splotched with grease.

Tony, sleep-drunk, thinks of his aching entrance and silk. He pushes up on the bed so he can sit.

“It’s today?”

“You’ve been sleep since we got here. It’s tomorrow now. Which is today,” Peter says. “The day you were born.”

Tony snorts. He unfolds the bag and digs in, grabbing fries to smash into his mouth.

“You know just how to…. Thanks, baby.”

“Before we eat….”

Tony unwraps his burger.

“There’s something I wanna do. Something important.”

“More than eating?”

He whips out a knife. “Give me your hand.”

Tony is reluctant to set down his food, but he does, though his brow curves up as he chews what he put in his mouth.

“Let’s make a promise,” Peter says. “A birthday blood pact.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“We’ll spend _every_ birthday here. Even when one of us dies.”

Tony stares at Peter. “You’re serious.”

Peter pricks his own thumb first to show that he means it. A red bubble swells. He doesn’t look pained.

“Every birthday. No matter what,” Peter says.

Tony consents to the pain and the promise. They link their pinkies and press together both bleeding thumbs. It’s the silliest, sweetest occultist act he recalls taking part in—another memory planted in the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve been watching RDJ movies all week when I have the time, and they’ve left me inspired and eager to share this chapter. On tumblr today, to further celebrate such a fucking legend, I’ll be posting a ficlet or two, theme: Daddy kink. Find me there @ dollmeatpie!


	9. Lemon Cake

Tony flaunts his tenderness. It’s not enough that Peter has apologized for the manner in which he drove into his husband’s delicate backside. No; Peter must be reminded of exactly what he’d done, of exactly why Tony sits how he does. It makes Peter timid. The lust and rage that’d coupled in him at the penthouse has abandoned his body and left him to face quite an outcome.

He wants to discuss it. Take Tony, tell him, _“I shouldn’t have fucked you so mean. But I liked it.”_ And that will cost him courage. The house, however—the longer they’re in it; the further they float into memory—has all but seduced his mind to regress to 18. So he sits, low in the grass near Tony’s feet as he drinks, as dinner crackles audibly on the grill.

*

“You’re quiet.”

Peter watches a spider approach Tony’s sandal. “I’m thinking,” he says.

“About?”

A pause. “Nothing….” He shifts, preparing to swat the arachnid. It turns away before he intervenes. “It’s just, it’s silly.”

“ _You’re_ silly.”

Peter hides his face.

“But you’re _my_ silly. Hm? And I like your silly thoughts, you know.”

“I know…. Just….”

“Yeah?”

With a sigh, Peter puffs his cheeks. Where he sits in the grass behind his dinner plate—cleared of food—he rocks in his cross-legged seat.

Tony slaps his thighs as a signal to _come_. Eager, Peter shifts forward enough to fold his arms on Tony’s lap and put down his chin.

“My softest boy. My sweetest, _honeyest_ lamb.”

Peter laughs.

“There he is.” He cups Peter’s face. A kiss spiced with sauce softens them both. “Would it be any consolation— _any_ at all—if I were to tell you I love you so much?”

“Just a bit.”

_“‘A bit’?”_

Another laugh springs out, this one shimmering more than the first. He presses his cheek to Tony’s thick leg and shuts his eyes. Tony kisses his ear. A cricket sings.

“Remember when I first let you fuck me? How _clumsy_ you were?”

“Tony….”

“How you _came_ in me not even 10 minutes after? No endurance. Just a boy who’d never put his dick into anything but his own sloppy hand.”

Quieting, Tony kisses below Peter’s ear. He speckles Peter’s pinked throat with the kisses.

“You looked so guilty, Peter. So ashamed. Just like now.”

__

“Stop….”

“I can’t. I won’t.”

Peter nuzzles closer until his face is utterly buried in Tony’s lap. Summer sounds continue to trill in the distance around their home. For Peter, it feels like this place is its own separate planet.

They remain as they are: Peter’s arms circling Tony’s waist and Tony folding so he can kiss and pet and whisper to his husband, who needs it, who would beg for it if he could, because being this pliant in Tony’s lap is far more delicious than getting to top. When Tony sits back, Peter continues to stare at his own eyelids. Tony takes hold of his nape. He squeezes it.

“But it’s not just that,” Tony says. “There’s something else on your mind. And it’s bigger.”

Peter’s silence confirms it.

*

It’s still Tony’s birthday when they’re stacked on each other upon one living room couch. They haven’t discussed Peter’s thoughts, though it’s coming. Just as Tony knows Peter thorough enough to intuit his secrets, Peter knows just how much time he’s afforded to keep them. It’s the respect of their union—the fellowship born of a decade growing together—and Peter, while shy in this moment, feels safe to share.

He exhales.

He lifts until he’s seated on Tony’s stomach.

“Am I crushing you?” he asks.

Tony adjusts Peter’s thighs. “You’re perfect.”

Peter reaches to Tony’s bitten shoulder.

“And we’re perfect. The best, actually.”

“I’m a _bug_.”

Tony chuckles. He reaches around Peter’s body and gropes his ass. “No mighty arachnid? Why the degradation, lemon cake?”

“Because I couldn’t protect you while I was sleeping and there was _nothing_ mighty about me then. I got so upset, and I took it out on you, and I was thinking about it while we were waiting for dinner and that’s when I remembered something else.”

“Remembered what?”

“This dream I had. At the hospital. It was”—he struggles—“about the place.”

He sees it happen the instant Tony reacts. The response is controlled; caged behind the eyes. The eyes, nonetheless, reveal a world of emotion.

“There was this spider. This giant, monstrous spider called the Great Weaver. It said we were friends. It told me—it said they were why— _how_ —I got out.”

*

“But it’s just a dream, right?” Peter asks in the shower, suds leaking from his hair to his face.

*

Peter dries only his curls. Then he dries Tony’s. He pats the water from Tony’s feet and legs and upper body, careful as he reaches the ring of crystals in his chest. Tony sticks a warm, appreciative kiss to his nose and lips before taking the towel and working the water from Peter’s body.

“You’re special,” Tony says once they’re in bed. He takes Peter’s hand. He kisses the thumb that had offered blood for their pact. “When you were shot…. When we were at the hospital….”

“Yeah?”

“Your blood. I tasted it. I _drank_ it. A little went in my mouth, and I was so wrecked and distraught and _mourning_ you….” He clears his throat. “Anyway. I get this bite. Yeah? Same night. You’re still in my system. And it could’ve been you. It should’ve been you. I’m _positive_ you’re what they wanted. But it wasn’t you. They didn’t know what you’d _do_. If you’d _beat_ them. So they—whoever they are; _whatever_ they—took you from me.

“Was it ‘just a dream’?” Tony jerks the well-bitten shoulder. “Perhaps. But what’s real? You’re still the _only_ one who’s come back from the Snap. And look: my thumb, where we did the pact?”

Peter examines it.

“Healed. All the way through. It’s not even sore.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, loves. It’s good to be back home here after such a spell of disconnect from this story. I hope to continue updating regularly as I once did and that we’ve all worked up an appetite for more chapters.
> 
> What are you dolls working on? I’d love to know. It’s hard on my attention span to read long posts on tumblr and I feel I’ve been missing out on so much fic in my absence here. Share your food!


	10. Sleep-warmed Sheets

In the night, when Peter is soft with sleep on his side of the bed, Tony wakes from an unpleasant dream. He blinks at the dark. Lifting a hand to caress Peter’s invention, he exhales his tension, settling his palm.

The arc reactor blooms soft light the more he awakens. Beneath, Tony’s pulse is a chaotic gallop.

He gets water.

He checks the news on his phone.

He checks his accounts.

As he’s transferring money to Peter, a shadow looms over.

“Are we still billionaires?”

“For the rest of our lives, honeylamb,” Tony says. “Why are you _up_ there?”

Peter doesn’t reply. Instead, the zip of a web shooting out to collect Tony’s glass fills the slumbering kitchen with sound.

“I can feel when you leave the bed,” he finally says after gulping the water upside down. “And I know you’re thinking about everything. What I told you. My blood.”

Tony’s aware from the decade of nighttime vibrations he’s failed to conceal. But the latter—the part that alludes to the conversation they’d had—gets him uptight.

“I just want you safe.”

“Let _me_ worry,” Peter says as he lowers the glass, returning it to Tony atop the counter. He scoffs. He then scrambles across the ceiling; across the room.

Tony watches, refreshing his drink as he stalls. When Peter crawls down to the window, Tony approaches.

“It could be out there. It could be _inside_.”

“Pete.”

“With us. Like before.” He faces Tony. “Like at the hospital. Tony. What if it’s _hiding_? In the dark? I should check, I should go out th—”

“No, Peter.”

“Anthony—”

“ _No_. We’re _safe_.”

“But we thought that before!”

“I won’t let you do this. I won’t let you”—he gestures over Peter—“make yourself _sick_ for this thing. For this _bite_ , I won’t let—”

Peter bumps by, scraping chests with his husband. Tony turns in time to catch Peter’s arms.

“Hold on a second.”

He stiffens. “Tony. I know what you’re gonna say. And it’s not fair. It’s not right that you expect me to just...do nothing. Do _nothing_ about it!”

“I’m not saying _‘do nothing’_. Think of how I feel for a moment. Hm?” Tony’s voice cracks. It lowers against Peter’s nape and he shuts his eyes. “I thought I’d _lost_ you. I thought you were _dead_. My husband. My _heart_.”

They’re silent. Tony audibly swallows and squeezes the strong, corded arms. He feels Peter slacken against him.

“I love you, Peter. I _love_ you.”

Peter sighs.

Tony gentles his hold before he releases him.

“I love you, too,” Peter says, facing his husband once more. “I love you. And that’s why...it’s the reason….”

A gorgeous, immediate fondness soaks Tony’s chest. He lifts Peter’s hands and sticks them all over with kisses. “Come back to bed,” he says. “Nothing’s wrong.” At last, they touch lips. Tony kisses them back to their sleep-warmed sheets.

*

Tony doesn’t wake again until far into the morning, and that’s good. His husband is tucked against him, and that, too, is good. Stripped of their clothes as to only feel skin upon skin, Tony curls his hand around Peter’s ass.

His eyes flutter closed as he pets Peter’s cheeks, thumb stroking over and back as he thinks of what Peter had said about them having kids. Because how would they do it? Would they adopt? Would they father one each with a woman they chose and trusted? And if so, how would each of their offspring look? What of their _genius_?

Tony exhales—slowly—through the nose. He’s ready for family. He’s ready to watch Peter tangle their children in webs. It’d be the balm; the distraction; the refreshment. It’d undoubtedly make their lives whole in a way inexperienced.

Peter’s voice then rolls from him nectar-thick. “I want a milkshake.”

“Yeah?”

“Vanilla. With rainbow sprinkles.”

“An _excellent_ choice.”

At the praise, Peter’s curly head pops up. Tony laughs and combs his hand through the mess of locks.

“And will you be sharing this treat with your husband? Or must you be stingy? Like the last time you wanted ice cream for breakfast? Mhm.” He cranes his neck; kisses Peter’s temple. “I didn’t forget.”

“You should probably get your own this time, then.”

*

It’s late enough in the morning that the nearest dessert cafe is open and empty, a bonus, for even Tony’s most clever disguises have failed to erase him from eyes trained and obtrusive. They order separate milkshakes—at which Peter smirks and pinks—and mount them on a glass standing table nearest the windows.

“I’ve always liked this place,” Peter says before consuming. They drink the thick treats in comfortable silence.

*

Tony loves the scent of batter and cream and milk on Peter. He loves the taste of Peter’s cold mouth. Outside, where the world is abuzz with passing cars and people, he steals an abundance of kisses, fingers and lips.

“I missed this, Peter.”

Their stride on the path is steady. Tony walks on the side against the street.

“It feels like we’ve been gone from this for _years_.”

Peter nods. He buries his fists in his jeans pockets.

“And I was thinking,” Tony continues, fitting his hand on the back of Peter’s neck. “About the kids. About the _life_ that would mean for us.”

“Really?” And Peter’s eyes are as big as they were in bed. “I mean, I knew…. It’s just….”

“We can. We _should_.”

Peter skips ahead so he’s walking backwards in the path of his husband. “It’s just that I’ve been thinking about it since I was shot—”

“Peter.”

“—I mean, _hurt_. Since I was hurt.”

Tony nods. He pockets his own hands, unable to help the grin tugging his lips.

“Like, you know, if we had a son, and he could be like you.”

They stop walking, Tony first, then Peter. Tony shakes his head and sighs, chuckling. “We’re so alike. I was thinking I wanted them just. Like. You.”

Peter grins. They’re leaning to kiss when he rears from the touch with a gasp.

Tony sees Peter lift his arms and cast his gaze on the hairs he knows are standing. No longer are they poised outside the boutiques. Tony envisions the bank; the gun; Rossini.

In a swarm of nanomachines, the suit grows to form around Tony’s body. The instant the rockets are whole beneath his feet, he charges Peter, snatches him off the pavement and into the wind.

Peter’s breath is sucked out of him. He flails, then he clings, but none of it lasts. Tony is setting him safely on a roof several shops down at the same time that metal splats into metal below on the street.

*

After the mess of crashed cars is extinguished by the public service departments, Tony descends to the roof behind Peter.

“I could’ve stopped it,” comes the young, bland voice. “I could’ve stopped it and you didn’t let me.”

The Iron Man dissolves from Tony’s face.

“I could’ve—”

“We’re heroes, Peter. Not God.”

Silence.

Tony sniffs. “I admit: that was insensitive.”

Peter snorts, shaking his head. He stands and turns and faces his disheveled husband.

“I’m sorry. I thought of—I saw the _bank_ and...and our _kids_ ….”

“I know.”

“I shouldn’t have. I shouldn’t. And I’m sorry.”

Peter takes Tony’s face. Their kiss is deep and warm, the same as it would have been had they not been alarmed by Peter’s beautiful, life-saving Sense. And it still tastes of breakfast, and that, in itself, comforts Tony. He chokes back a sob, pressing his forehead to Peter’s.


End file.
